


Bertram Wilberforce Wooster and the Helen of W1

by utopiantrunks



Category: Jeeves & Wooster, Jeeves - P. G. Wodehouse
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2007-09-26
Updated: 2007-09-26
Packaged: 2019-06-30 04:29:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 25,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15744321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/utopiantrunks/pseuds/utopiantrunks
Summary: A friend comes to town desirous of aid. The dead past reveals itself dreadfully lax in its burial practices. Life soon takes on the tone of one of those Greek tragedies where you can't stop in anywhere for lunch without eating a close relative. Also, there are groceries.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm taking advantage of the TV series timeline, which gives us both the kickoff event and an unmarried Bingo at the time of.
> 
> **Warning:** This story is permanently unfinished.

I suppose, to begin at the beginning of this particular yarn, as all conscientious wordsmiths should, one would have to go back to when God created the world. You know, the let there be light part--dreadfully impressive, dramatic bit, that, I always thought. Now, I once won a prize for Scripture Knowledge, back in school, and if I recall, it happened along these lines. Day One: heavens, earth, light. Days Two through Four: earth, water, stars, trees, grass, rhubarb, continents, mountains, I suppose--the general fixtures of the place. Then on Days Five and Six, God created all the living creatures, which must have kept Him frightfully busy, what with whales and elephants and things like peacocks which have all the little fiddly bits. What with there being such a bally lot of fauna charging about the place, it didn't get its own mention, but somewhere in there, in those two days, I mean, God created the newt. 

And that is where the trouble began. 

It hasn't yet been explained or quantified by science, but the newt exerts a kind of deadly fascination on chaps of a certain makeup, of the kind which causes them to lurk in dark rooms in remote corners of the countryside, goggling into damp tanks full of salamanders all day. Terrifying, really, but because it is such a rare affliction, this condition has not received the attention from the medical community that one might hope, or that I might hope, given that one of my oldest friends is a sufferer. 

I have known Augustus Fink-Nottle since we were both in sailor suits, and as a child and young man he was as regular a chap as any, though perhaps a trifle more likely than most to hesitate when asked if he were man or mouse. Round about our entry into Eton, however, someone--the Fiend himself, I shouldn't wonder--introduced poor old Gussie to the study of newts, and the deal was sealed. The rest of us tried to shake him free of the reptile's clammy grasp, but there was nothing for it. After Cambridge, Gussie biffed off to Lincolnshire to answer the call of the newt and no one heard word nor saw hair of him for years until one day he surfaced in London, and in short order got himself engaged to a certain Miss Madeline Bassett. Rum ending for him, but rather a lucky escape for me, seeing as I was next in line for the chopping block. 

It had taken a good amount of coaxing and scheming, a fair taxation of the grey matter on my own and my valet Jeeves's parts, and no small amount of exertion to slot Gussie into this engagement. In the months that followed I began to wonder if it hadn't been a mistake, if I shouldn't have sent him and his heartbreak over the Bassett straight back to Lincolnshire to commune with the tadpoles. Because, you see, once wrested from his den of glass and slime, he seemed reluctant to go back, and he began popping up in my midst with alarming frequency. That would have been all to the good, were he behaving like the friend of my youth and brother of my bosom he was supposed to be, but for a teetotalling, juice-guzzling poop who had socialised exclusively with amphibians for over a decade, Gussie's head had been turned by the whole engagement lark, and he had gotten increasingly above himself ever since. That is to say, whether he was making up for a wasted youth, or had simply snapped after trading lizards for a woman who spouted poetry like a _Palgrave's_ with a leak, he now fancied himself equal to breaking and resuming his engagement, flirting with various members of the fairer s., appearing on stage, pinching dogs, and all manner of mischief for which he simply was not qualified. And who, when the music stopped, was left holding the bag? Good old Bertram, you can put your shirt on it. 

That is why, come one Wednesday afternoon, I did not leap from my seat at the Drones Club bar and throw open my arms when Gussie arose beside me like the Ghost of Christmas Past or some such spectre. Instead, I nearly fell off my chair, and when I had clawed my way back level with my half-eaten lunch, responded to his greeting with a restrained, "Oh, hallo, Gussie. What brings you to the old metrop?" 

My reservation and the chilliness of my regard were, as they are on so many thoughtless coves, lost on Gussie. "The highest calling, Bertie," said the young newt-fancier. "Love." 

"Right ho," I said, and reapplied myself to the steak and kidney. It turned to ashes in my mouth, but I persevered. Dashed unfortunate, it seemed to me, that Gussie had ever sussed that a small enough newt tank was portable, and just as well off in London as anywhere. 

Gussie had more to say, and after a minute or two watching me get outside my lunch, he gave up on my asking the leading q. and forged on alone. "Bertie," he said earnestly, "I need your help." 

I might have replied that he'd had enough of that lately to exhaust the quota from this lifetime of bosom friendship and make a significant dent in the next, but when an old school chum, whose Eton collar I had many a time had to refasten, fixes me with the big and soulful, the Wooster heart is as a melty thing on a hot whatsit. 

"Say away, Gussie, old thing," I said gallantly, for, I mean to say, what sort of _preux chevalier_ abandons a friend in need, even if that friend is a newt-fancying social land mine? "What's troubling you?" 

A look of deep relief and gratitude filled the poor fish's goggling eyes and he clambered onto the seat beside me. "Bertie," he said, "I need to write a love letter." 

"Oh," I said. "Is that all?" My appetite, which had flown the coop at Gussie's unlooked for resurgence, poked its nose back round the door. 

"I'm no good with fine words and so forth, Bertie, you know that." 

"I should think being engaged to Madeline Bassett would've put you in training something frightful. It's nothing but fairies and rabbits and glittering tears sunup to sundown with her, isn't it?" 

"That stuff's no good," said Gussie scornfully. 

"She's heard it all before, being the _avant-maître_ , you mean." 

"The _avant_ what?" 

"Er... an old hand, I should think it means. Or maybe I've got it wrong. Think I heard it from Jeeves." 

"Ah!" said Gussie with some emotion. 

"Of course," I said. "You actually came to see Jeeves, didn't you?" 

"No!" said Gussie, taking on the distinct look of a trout's underbelly. "Who told you that? Don't be ridiculous!" 

Again the old brotherly warmth touched me between the third and fourth rib. Jolly decent of Gussie to spare my feelings, and all that, but I had got used to my pals calling on me just to lay their problems before Jeeves. "No, you're quite right, Gussie. Jeeves is just the man for the job. He's fuller of fine words than Shakespeare himself. In fact, he's applied himself to this very errand before. If you need to top old Madeline in the area of flowery verbiage, Jeeves--" 

Gussie gave a sort of pained cry and gulped like a draining bath. "No," he said in a low, desperate sort of tone. "It must be you, Bertie!" 

Well, this quite pacified me, and I would have leapt wholeheartedly to Gussie's aid even were it not in my own interests to keep the love light for Gussie firmly in the Bassett's wide blues. 

We retired to the lounge, ensconced ourselves comfortably, and Gussie produced a pen and paper. At the top of one page it read, in the atrocious scrawl Gussie passes off as handwriting which seems to indicate paper is going at five shillings per square inch, _My Dearest._

"That's as far as I'd got," said Gussie. 

"Well, well," I said and cracked the old knuckles. "Well, well, well." 

"It's no use sitting there saying 'well.' What shall I write?" 

"I was thinking," said I. 

"Is that what it sounds like." 

"Yes," I said. "Anyway, how about opening up with a line of poetry? She likes that sort of thing." 

Gussie gave me a strange look, and fiddled with his collar. "Yes," he said. 

"There was something I learnt at Oxford, a right romantic wheeze. How did it go...? Oh! 'Ah Love, tum tumty tumty-tum, tum-tum tum-tumty something something.'" 

"You want me to write, 'tumty-tum'?" 

"Well, no. The actual lines would be favourite. I thought you might know them." 

"I see." 

"Er." I sensed my stock as love letter consultant was falling. "What about an opening of the heart, then? Show the true passion of Augustus as it has never before been revealed, what?" 

Gussie looked dubious. I hastened to add, "We'll dress it up a bit, old man." 

He consented to play along, and we batted the thing around like a couple of arthritic badminton players till we came out, fingers ink-stained and many a sheet of paper crumpled, with something that, considered in a certain light, very nearly resembled a letter. 

"'My Dearest Madeline,'" I read. "'My heart beats double-time at your approach--' Good that, eh? 'The sound of your voice calms my fearful heart and nurtures in me a sense that all is well.' Does it really? Well, never mind. To each his own, I suppose. 'Your strength is like unto Hercules, or Atlas as he...' Really, Gussie, I wish you'd reconsider this part. She isn't Honoria Glossop." 

"It stays," sniffed Gussie. 

I sighed. It was hardly the sort of thing a romantic girl liked to be praised for, but Gussie had taken paternal pride in all of his contributions to the ghastly communication, and wouldn't budge. The sequel to that sentence, mentioning how Gussie became faint at these displays of most unfeminine hardiness, seemed to me to paint him in an extremely unflattering light, but he was adamant about that, too. One could only hope Madeline found it romantic, and perhaps Gussie knew best on that score--I certainly couldn't understand the confounded woman. 

"The next part's better," I said. "'Your eyes speak of the wisdom of ages; in their rich brown depths I find the balm of my soul's cares.' That's a jolly good bit," I said proudly. I had cleaned it up from Gussie's initial, 'Your brains give me the shivers.' Madeline's brains do rather give me a shot of ice water along the spinal c., but no use being _quite_ so honest. I thought my improvements rather inspired. 'Balm' had remained 'thingummy' for about an hour, too, until Barmy Fotheringay-Phipps passed through and I clicked. "I say, though, Gussie. Madeline's eyes are blue, aren't they?" 

"Hm?" said young Gussie. He gave me that look again, like we were dining with the Borgias and he was hoping I would try the salmon mousse before he risked a go at it. "Oh, yes," he said, waving one hand dismissively. "I'll change it when I copy it out." 

"Fancy forgetting that," I chided. "The eyes of the one you love." 

"Yes," Gussie agreed with a faraway expression. 

We pushed on. The moon and stars had been applied with a liberal hand, though we'd steered clear of rainbows, fairies and bunnies; there was some twilight, but just enough, I thought. 

We hadn't quite finished the recital when Bingo Little popped his head in to remind me we were meeting Catsmeat and Barmy for dinner and the latest at the Palladium, so I made my excuses to Gussie and started off home to dress for dinner. 

As I was collecting my hat and coat, Gussie ran out after me. "Bertie!" he cried. "How shall I sign it?" 

"Oh, 'With love,' I should think," I said, buttoning up the coat and shooting the old cuffs. 

"That's too banal, Bertie, I need something better." 

I was anxious, by this point, to get alongside some more jovial company, a spot of dinner, and rather more than a spot of whiskey, as I had been bending the bean to this matter of the love letter for a little over three of the small hand and needed to undo the ill effects. I reached quickly through the mists and hit upon a wheeze that'd turned up in _Love and Murder in the Gloaming_. "Sign it 'Your Ardent Admirer.'" 

"Your Ardent Admirer." Gussie tried it on. "That's not bad! Thanks awfully, Bertie!" 

"Toodle-pip!" I said, and made my exit. 

* * *

The dinner we had at the Savoy was all that could have been hoped. The musical comedy at the Palladium, sadly, was not, and Bingo and I cheesed it during the interval. I trickled back into the flat, therefore, just before ten. As I was closing the door, a smallish youth in some manner of uniform ran up to me in the hall and shoved an envelope into my hands. He remained ostentatiously _in situ_ until I tipped him, then biffed off. I stepped inside and Jeeves, my man, materialised in my midst with a silver tray bearing the old w. and s. 

"Good evening, sir," said the hardy fellow, setting the tray on the coffee table and moving to help me out of my coat and jacket. "Your slippers are just there." 

"Good evening, Jeeves," I said. "Some infant's just toddled by with this for you." I glanced at the envelope before handing it over. "Looks like it's been addressed by a palsied chimpanzee." 

"Thank you, sir. Was the entertainment at the Palladium not to your liking, sir?" 

"A washout, Jeeves." I availed myself of the restorative he'd laid out for me. 

"I am sorry to hear that, sir." 

"You'll never guess who's in town again," I said. 

"Who is that, sir?" 

"Gussie Fink-Nottle!" I said. "For someone who used to shun the crowded places, he's been cropping up lately like a bad penny. Have his own flat in the metrop. before long. Had me working all afternoon like a bally scribe, and on what, do you fancy?" 

"I could not guess, sir." 

"No, by Jove, I'd rather say you couldn't! A love letter! If you'll credit it." 

"That is a coincidence, sir. I find myself in receipt of such a missive this evening." 

"Yes, that's what I said--what?" I turned round to see Jeeves holding a letter of two sheets before him, eyeing it as a collector might regard a silver creamer. "Jeeves, what did you say?" 

"A love letter, it would appear, sir." 

It has been said--most emphatically and often by my Aunt Agatha--that I have not the keenest mind in the Commonwealth, that I am Eton's least likely to be sought out by Scotland Yard to solve the mystery of the missing Crown Jewels, and similar slights against that which resides between my collar and top hat, but once in a while inspiration does visit me, like the moon emerging from behind the clouds on a dark night and so forth, enabling me to connect the dots, put two and two together, and generally cotton on. That is to say--sudden appearance of Gussie, confusion of fiancée's eye colour, exceedingly unfeminine description of same, abominable chicken-scratchings on envelope delivered to 6A Crichton Mansions... 

"Jeeves," I said, with dawning horror, "how is the letter signed?" 

"It is anonymous, sir." 

"Yes, but the... closing, if that's the word I want?" 

"It is, sir. It is signed 'Your Ardent Admirer.'" 

"Good heavens," I said.


	2. Chapter 2

"You goggle-eyed blighter!" 

It may tell you something about the membership of the Drones Club that when I strode into the smoking room thus declaiming, everyone present lifted their eyes to me like the little dog by the gramophone hearing his master's voice. "Gussie!" I specified, and most of them went back to their own occupations. 

Gussie was standing off in one corner, leaning against the wall, the spitting image of the cat who has eaten the family budgerigar and is sitting under the cage with feathers in his whiskers. He gulped a bit. "Hallo, Bertie," he said. 

"Don't you 'hallo, Bertie' me," I said. 

"Then what should I say to you?" 

"I think something along the lines of 'forgive me, friend of my youth, for my base betrayal,' accompanied by some general breast-beating and bewailing your outcast state would fit the facts of the case nicely, don't you?" 

"Oh, but Bertie--" Gussie started. 

"Not a word of it," I said, holding up one imperious hand. "You disappoint me sorely, young Gussie. One would think a lifetime of friendship would earn some loyalty, some decent human feeling, some brother sentiment! And yet you, you go snaking about in the grass like a... snaky thing. Which lives in grass. Trying to hire my valet out from under my nose, behind my back, and having _me_ write the letter! Well, really, Gussie, I ask you." 

"Bertie--" 

"And, to the left, Gussie, what are you doing in my club? I called at your hotel and was told you'd come here." 

"I'm a member," said Gussie, drawing himself up a bit. It wasn't a terribly impressive display, but for Gussie, a straightening of the spine was a significant step. 

"Who on earth put you up?" 

"I did, old man," said a voice by my elbow, "years ago." 

"Bingo!" said I. 

"Hallo," said Bingo Little. "What's all the shouting about? Thought I heard Stilton from the other room." 

I stiffened. Whatever you may say of B. Wooster, he is not the sort of fellow to go about the place shouting "Ho!" at all and sundry and threatening violence against spines. "Why," I asked in a calmer voice, "would you put Gussie up for membership?" 

"We were at school together," said Bingo, eyeing me as though he suspected I had put away a few too many for this time of day. 

"What?" I gave him a touch of the old eyebrow. 

"Bertie," said Bingo, "I was at school with you since Kindergarten." 

"Yes." 

"And you were at school with Gussie, weren't you?" 

"Yes," I admitted. 

"So." 

"Well, I'm dashed," I said. Although I would readily have copped to going to school with either Bingo or Gussie, I couldn't recall ever, in all those years, having seen them together. It was as though they belonged to two different childhoods. "You know each other, then?" 

"Of course," said Bingo. 

"Well," I said, folding my arms and glaring at Gussie out of the corner of my eye, "you and I clearly made a bad choice of pals, Bingo." 

"Oh, come now, Bertie." 

"There's no 'come now' about it! He's trying to hire Jeeves off me!" 

At this, at least, Bingo looked suitably taken aback. He looked at Gussie. "Surely not?" 

"He had me writing the letter all afternoon," I said, "thinking it was for his fiancée. He sent it to Jeeves!" 

"Is that what you two were working on," said Bingo. "Well, Gussie?" 

"I'm not trying to hire him!" said Gussie. 

"'Your brains give me the shivers,'" I said icily. "I might have known." 

"But I don't want to hire him!" Gussie protested. He lowered his voice to a fierce whisper. "I'm in _love_ , Bertie." 

"I know you are," I said. "That's no excuse to steal my valet. He's certainly helped you enough in my employ." 

"No, no, no," hissed Gussie, his voice so low now that Bingo and I were forced to lean in to hear him. "I'm in love with _him_. With _Jeeves._ " 

There was a moment of silence. I looked at Bingo. Bingo looked at me. United, we looked at Gussie, who blinked back fishily. 

"Well, now, look here, Gussie," said Bingo. 

"Yes. As he said, look here." I did so, as well. Looked there, that is. At Bingo, I mean to say. 

"That was about it, really," said Bingo, abashed. 

"You can't be in love with Jeeves, Gussie," I said, taking the baton, so to speak. 

"Why not?" demanded Gussie. 

"Bingo will tell you," I said. 

Bingo shot me an unfriendly look. "It isn't the done thing," he said. 

"Exactly," I agreed. 

"I don't care if it's the done thing," said Gussie, thrusting out his chin defiantly. He hasn't so terribly much of one to be thrusting about with abandon like that, but thrust it he did. 

"He says he doesn't care, Bertie." 

"Yes." 

Bingo and I took a moment to light a pair of cigarettes and commune withal as the wheels turned. 

"He is rather a corker, your Jeeves," said Bingo thoughtfully. 

"What a mind!" Gussie said devoutly. 

"Of course," I allowed. "But--" 

"Quite good looking, too," said Bingo, "objectively speaking." 

"Tall, dark and handsome," sighed Gussie. 

"True, if you like," I said, "but that is not the point at issue." 

"And he's ever so strong," said Gussie with a sigh, like the dreamy-eyed heroines you found in Rosie M. Banks novels. 

"Is he?" said Bingo. 

"Rather," I answered. "I've seen him sling a man my size over his shoulder like he was a down pillow." 

"Really?" Gussie breathed in an enraptured voice. I saw this had not been the time or place. 

"What for?" Bingo asked. 

"He was drunk. Wilmot, Lord Pershore, that is; not Jeeves. Jeeves had to carry him in to bed." 

Gussie's mien took a distressing turn for the pink, transforming him from trout to ornamental carp. "I wish Jeeves would carry _me_ to bed." 

I swallowed a stream of smoke and coughed for a minute like the combined tuberculosis ward of St. Francis. "Contain yourself, Gussie," I said once I had recovered, and was about to add harsher words when Bingo laid a hand on my shoulder as if to say, "Steady on," so I subsided. 

"What brought all this on, Gussie?" Bingo asked in a kind, brotherly sort of manner. 

Gussie gave another of those deep, simpering sighs. It made the skin crawl. "It was a few weeks ago in Totleigh-in-the-Wold," he said. "You remember, Bertie?" 

"Distinctly," said I. 

"I was being pursued by this ghastly policeman," Gussie told Bingo, eyes bright, "and I climbed up a tree to escape." 

"Oh dear, Gussie," Bingo clucked. "We really neglected your education at Eton, didn't we?" I agreed with him there. If there is one thing any red-blooded English schoolboy knows, it's not to get himself treed like a cat at the drop of a hat. 

"Well," continued Gussie, "I was up there with no means of escape, and the constable just waiting for me to come down. And sooner or later, I should have been forced to." 

I began to see where the problem had arisen, but I held my peace. There was Gussie, up a tree which may as well have been an ivory tower, exhibiting all the symptoms of a Medieval damsel in distress treed, or rather towered, by a dragon. I had seen him exhibiting the same s. when I myself stepped in at Totleigh Towers to chase off Roderick Spode, who was intent on kicking Gussie's spine through his hat, viz., the worshipful gaze, the tremulous voice as he spoke my name and then went on to praise my courage in the face of dragons and dictators. Still, to my knowledge, Gussie had not fallen in love with me over this incident. Of course, Gussie had known me since we were in sailor suits; he had witnessed the results of my accepting a challenge to eat a half-pound of red peppers, and that does tend to take the glamour off. 

When I tuned in again, Gussie was reenacting the climax of the story, and I had to duck to avoid being brained by an enthusiastic mime of Jeeves sloshing Constable Oates over the head with a stout tree limb. Gussie was only using his clasped hands, but it still wasn't a blow I thought bore stopping with my head. "He went down like a sack of cement," Gussie crowed. "It was a thing of beauty and a joy forever, wasn't it, Bertie?" 

"Oh, ah, rather. Look, Gussie," I said, with gentle sympathy, "I see why it would have made quite the impression on you, and all that, but nevertheless..." 

"Oh, gosh!" Gussie exclaimed and pulled out his pocket watch. "I must get back to my hotel! I'm in the middle of an experiment. If I don't give the test group their supplement on time, I'll have to start over from scratch. Good afternoon, Bertie, Bingo!" 

He legged it, muttering things about newts that were no doubt inappropriate for mixed company--luckily there was none of that about--and I put out my cigarette, furrowed the b., and frowned after him. 

"Nevertheless what?" Bingo asked. 

"Eh?" 

"You said you understood Jeeves making an impression on the poor blighter, but nevertheless..." 

"Oh," I said, "I don't know. I think I was going to say something about Jeeves having an allergy to newts." 

"Has he?" 

"Not that I know of. But he might have." 

"Tut, Bertie," Bingo said with a reproving shake of the bean. 

I sighed. "You're quite right, Bingo. But what should I do? I don't think Jeeves would be as tolerant in his views of Gussie's... er... fascination as you or I. You know how he is. Soft-fronted shirts with evening wear give him fits. What will he do if he finds out one of my friends is harbouring feelings for him warmer than those of mere friendship?" 

"You've a point there," Bingo agreed. He puffed thoughtfully for a moment. "No," he said, "nothing will come of it. Before Gussie plucks up the courage to send a signed letter, the whole thing will have vanished from his mind like the morning dew." 

"You think so, do you?" I asked. 

"Sure of it, old thing. You know, what you need is a drink," he added, taking my arm and leading me towards the bar. "Buy us one, Bertie?" 

I acquiesced, and we tipped back a cup or two each of the old familiar before heading out. Robinson, the cloakroom attendant, popped in with our coats. 

"Don't be too harsh on old Gussie," Bingo said as Robinson popped out again. "All that newt business has just slowed down his natural development. After all, at Eton, you and I..." You have my word, he said it just like that, without a blush. 

I picked up his slack, so to speak, _in re_ blushing. "If you must bring up childhood foibles, Bingo, yes," I whispered, searching out of the corner of my eye for the resurgence of Robinson. "But that ended at Eton." 

"What about at Oxford, then?" 

If the heat in my cheeks was any indication, I was doing a fair impression of a particularly spectacular sunset. "That was once!" I said. 

"Twice." 

" _That_ didn't count." 

"You never were strong in maths." 

"Anyhow, with you and me it was different," I said, turning my back on him to mask my agitation. "And besides, I take no responsibility. You took advantage of my generous nature." 

"Really." I had just time to register a familiar, rummy tone in his voice before he seized my lapel to turn me towards him, pushed me up against the wall and kissed me. 

My attempted cry of protest resulted only in allowing Bingo's tongue access to places it had no right being, especially in the vestibule of the Drones. I tried to push him away, but Bingo has the advantage of me in height and build, and at that juncture he also had it in balance, as he had upset mine in shoving me, and what was keeping me upright was largely the support of the leg he had planted between my own. When I made my attempt to shift him and escape, therefore, the result was rather more friction in a delicate area--and I don't mean the Drones Club vestibule--than prescribed for a young gentleman in a public place. I shuddered and subsided, defeated, and Bingo took his time to make his point. 

When he deigned to allow me to breathe, I was flushed from collar to earlobes and somewhat short on wind. "You _ass_ ," I hissed. 

Bingo looked challengingly into my eyes. Then his gaze flicked downward, and back up to meet mine, and if the expression distorting his map was not a fiendish smirk, many experts on the matter shall have to retire. He released my lapels and stepped back. "Your generous nature is showing, Bertie." 

Before I collected my thoughts enough to form a rejoinder, the front door had swung shut, leaving me to look desperately round for observers--thankfully discovering none--and button my overcoat carefully all the way down before making my way home. 

I entered the flat in restive mood, if restive is the word I want. No sooner had I doffed my coat and hat than Jeeves shimmered up with a glass of the needful. He is a boon when my mind is ill at ease, a positive Rock of Ages. I mean to say, hardly had I brought my wearied brow on the premises, and here was Jeeves rushing forth with the hand--or in this case the gin and tonic--to soothe it. Worthy fellow! 

"Do you know what I like best about you, Jeeves?" I asked over the rim of the glass. 

"No, sir," he said, "but I am agog to learn." He looked it, too. I don't know how he does it, with only that quarter-inch of eyebrow movement he allows himself. Perhaps it was the keen sparkle in his eye, or a certain adjustment to his already perfect posture, but if he wasn't positively brimming with interest, there was a place waiting for him at the Royal Shakespeare Company. 

"Well, I mean," I said, "besides your sterling qualities as a valet and general Solomonish fixer-of-rummy-situations type of thing." 

"Thank you, sir." 

"Not at all. But beyond that, Jeeves, you are not the type of man to go shoving chaps around and taking liberties with their persons in general." 

Jeeves's right eyebrow climbed the prescribed eighth of an inch above the left. "I should hope not, sir." 

"Although," I said, taking another sip, "you have been known on occasion to club the constabulary with tree limbs." 

"Unfortunately true, sir," said Jeeves, undergoing another of his mysterious shifts of attitude wherein, without twitching more than two facial muscles, the config. of the map had altered to convey a sort of stoic chagrin. 

"You were possessed of the right public spirit at the time, Jeeves," I hastened to add. "Desperate times, you know." 

"Thank you, sir. While Constable Oates, were he in possession of all the facts, would certainly feel I had taken a liberty as regards him, I would not like for you to feel I had done so towards yourself, sir." 

"No fear, Jeeves." I set down my empty glass, feeling the tissues admirably restored. "Though," I added, to myself, "there were some unintended consequences to that bit of knight errantry." 

"Sir?" said Jeeves. 

"Oh, nothing, Jeeves. Ah, I shall be lunching and dining at home. I think I've had all I can stick of the Drones, today." 

"Very good, sir." 

Jeeves floated off to the kitchen and I retrieved a book from my nightstand-- _Avery Jones and the Ruby Emblem_ \--and made myself comfortable on the sofa to wait for lunch. 

There was something soothingly domestic about sitting there, hearing faint noises from the kitchen and imagining Jeeves working his magic in there, soon to bring me my daily b. in the comfort and tranquility of my own cosy flat. Not quite soothing enough, however, because I found myself reading and rereading one paragraph until the scene where private detective Avery Jones--who looked rather like Bingo in a trench coat, in my mind's eye--meets his lady client was practically etched into my eyelids. The events of the day were weighing on my mind. 

The fact towards which Bingo had so insistently steered my attention was that such things--chaps writing love letters to their fellow men and so forth--did have its heyday at Eton. What with several hundred boys coming into the full flower of youth, as it were, in the same place, some high, and perhaps misplaced, feelings were inevitable. In the absence of any of the actual delicately nurtured, the thing became a question of degree; what I mean is, the attention due the d. n. fell instead to those more delicately nurtured than oneself. Even I, the undersigned B. Wooster, received a cerain amount of said attention, chiefly during my first year at Eton, when I still wore my hair long and exhibited, so Bingo tells me, a certain gentle reticence (which I maintain was purely the outward manifestation of a proper upbringing). This attention came most notably from certain year sevens in our House, and occasioned some hard feelings on Bingo's part, resulting in the incident with the itching powder in several upperclassmen's wardrobes, Bingo's harrowing experience with the Headmaster, and a certain deepening of our friendship beyond the constraints usual to English society outside public school walls. 

As I understand it, this is the usual progression. First steps in romantic directions are taken with whomever is about, and subsequently a man goes on to woo girls as per spec. Bingo had certainly pursued enough girls for several men, even if he hadn't as many engagements to his name as I had. Aside from Bingo, and those year sevens, I had been saved from much unpleasantness by a timely haircut and the arrival of the next class of first years, which brought with it Edmond Carmichael-Worthington, a.k.a. Eddie, a.k.a. the Helen of Eton. 

Poor Eddie took the pressure right off the incoming classes for the next three years. He was smallish--a frailer specimen than I, at any rate--he was blond and had made the same mistake as I in coming to Eton with his primary school locks intact, and he had the largest, most arresting blue eyes I have ever encountered in England. He looked as though he'd fallen out of one of those Church murals you see all over Italy, so full of cherubs it's a wonder anyone can move without tripping over one. 

The romantically inclined of the school lost their heads over him. They followed him about, hung on his every word, slipped him their pudding at dinner and so forth as though they were paying court to Cleopatra. Or, rather, Helen, as that was the nickname he earned himself. I don't suppose he was dreadfully pleased with it, himself, but he seemed to bear it, and all the boys fawning over him, with grace enough. I suppose it was better than some of the harassment other first-years put up with. 

In the end, it all sorted itself out. The autumn of our fifth year--Eddie's fourth--we came back from holidays and Eddie had shot up about a foot, traded in the choir's prize soprano for a baritone that squeaked like a sofa stuffed with field mice, and contracted a case of spots that wanted the touch of a saint to cure it. Helen of Eton was no more. Everyone who had gone off his head went back to seeing Eddie as one of the lads, and that was that. 

Jeeves shimmered into the dining room bearing a tray: veal cutlet and roasted vegetables, French onion soup and a glass of red wine. He was on the point of disappearing again when I called, "Jeeves?" 

He paused in the doorway. "Yes, sir?" 

"Your voice has already changed, hasn't it?" I asked. 

"Indeed, sir." 

I inclined the coconut. "Not much chance of it changing again, I suppose?" 

"The contingency is a remote one, sir." His right eyebrow began the upwards climb. 

"Already more or less reached maximum height, eh?" 

"I expect so, sir, yes." 

"And, ah... rather past the age for spots, what?" I asked. Reaching a bit, yes, but it was silly, I felt, to leave stones unturned. 

"Yes, sir." 

"Blast," I said. Chaps in books always seemed to be finding the answer to their present pickles in fond memories of the past. There would be a chapter delving into the childhood of the hero, then, bang, on page one of the next chapter, he'd cry out, "Of course! He's hidden the Bishop's ring in the old schoolyard where first he espied Evelyn Gloucester!" My recollection of my youth hadn't done the trick at all, but I suppose that's the result of spending said y. with the sort of Johnnies who wrote love letters to one another. 

"Sir?" 

"Oh, never mind," I said. I set down my book and installed myself at table. "Thank you, Jeeves." 

" _Bon appetit,_ sir."


	3. Chapter 3

I think the saying goes that those who do not learn from history are doomed to eat it. Eating history doesn't sound quite right... Perhaps it's an American expression. The upshot, at any rate, is that one ought to learn from one's past, and this was driven home to me when I walked into the Drones Club the following evening and opened the dining room door onto a standing room only crowd, in what appeared to be the full swing of a bachelor party, to judge from the volume of the uplifted voices. Just as I was about to collar one of the merrymakers and ascertain the nature of the celebration so that I could properly take part, a roar rose from what looked to be a hundred throats and sounded like more, and that roar was, "To Jeeves!" 

I froze in the doorway. For a moment, I stared blankly at the scene before me, the wheels upstairs vainly turning, but the brain had no solution to offer. I retreated a brace of steps and closed the door. For a minute or so, I stared at it. The _mot juste_ , in hindsight, might have been, "What fresh Hell is this?" but the Bertram of the hour was struck speechless. 

"You've seen it, then, have you, Bertie?" said Bingo's voice at my back. I swung round, and looked at him with a wild surmise. Gussie lingered in the background, looking several budgerigars guiltier than the day before. 

"What...?" I began. "What... That is to say, what?" 

Bingo took my arm kindly and steered me into the vestibule. "What?" I asked again plaintively as he helped me into my coat and handed me my hat. I obediently donned it, and he led me outside, Gussie trailing behind. 

"No good dining here, old thing," said Bingo gently. "Let's find ourselves a restaurant, eh?" 

  
  
"What on earth was going on at the Drones?" I demanded, when the three of us were safely ensconced at a secluded table at the Ritz, cocktails in hand. 

"Gussie stirred them up," said Bingo. 

I looked at Gussie, who was, as ever, drinking orange juice. He had resorted to brandy in Totleigh-in-the-Wold, so at least according to him, I reasoned, the worst had not yet come. 

"I was only talking to Bingo," said Gussie. 

"About Jeeves," supplied the other half of the sketch. 

"Yes, well, about how he'd helped me out of the soup with Spode--" 

"What, again?" I asked. 

"The first time, I mean," said Gussie. 

"Oh, all right, carry on." 

"So, as I say, how he helped me out of the situation with Spode, and then again with the law--" 

"To say nothing of your fiancée," I said. 

"Yes, to say nothing of her," said Gussie coldly. "Anyhow, then Claude came round--" 

"Who?" I asked. 

"Catsmeat," said Bingo. 

"And Barmy looked in," said Gussie, "and they wanted to know what we were talking about, and I told them about how Jeeves brought Sippy--" 

"Who?" asked Bingo. 

"Cambridge," I explained. 

Bingo snorted. 

Gussie gave him a brief glare, but continued, "Jeeves brought Sippy and his fiancée together, and then they told _me_ about--" 

"Long story short," said Bingo, "there was a certain amount of tale-telling, and chaps just kept joining in." 

"Most of them were drinking," said Gussie. 

"Not orange juice, I suppose," I said. 

"No," said Gussie. "And everyone agreed what a fine man Jeeves was, and began toasting him and so on..." 

"He has done a bit of good for a lot of us," said Bingo. 

"All right," I said. Bertram Wooster is a man with a positive outlook. Life has treated me well, and so I tend towards the sunnier view of things, if two are available and the choice mine. Now, if the entire membership of the Drones Club, and half of London besides, wanted to drink toasts to my valet, then fair play to them, I thought, though the toastee might have felt himself better done by as recipient of one or two of those drinks. Three things, however, held me back from this harmless interpretation of the circs. The first was an instinct, an intuition, a general rummy feeling I'd had on entering that dining room, like a horse who had nosed open the door to the glue factory. The other two things were seated across from me, looking sheepish. The suspense was too great: I flipped to the final page. 

"What's wrong?" I asked. 

Gussie and Bingo exchanged a look. They both made to speak, but Bingo was quicker off the mark: " _I_ didn't mention Helen of Eton." 

"Oh, no," I said. 

"But someone did," said Gussie. 

"Oh, no," I repeated. 

"That's about the size of it, old man," said Bingo. "It seems some of the Drones from Charterhouse had a similar bit of rannygazoo, only they called their star Cleopatra, and the boys in St. John's at Oxford even had a Venus." 

"You'd think they'd have outgrown it by university," I said, "but that's St. John's for you." 

Bingo and Gussie nodded sagely. I hadn't known the St. John's boys at Cambridge were bounders, too, but there you have it from the mouths--or chins--of babes, sucklings and teetotallers. 

"So, ah," said Bingo. He had another shot at his drink. "What's happened is, you see... They've declared Jeeves the Helen of W1." 

"I see," I said. Chilled steel. 

There was a certain amount of throat-clearing and glancing about, and then very slow, thoughtful sipping of drinks. A waiter--wearing, I could not help noticing, a handsome white mess jacket--arrived and we occupied ourselves a while longer with chin-stroking over menus and asking after specials. When he had pushed off, Bingo said, "Well, I expect it'll blow over quickly enough. You know how trends come and go at the Drones. Right, Gussie?" 

"Oh, yes." 

"I expect you're right," I said. The prospect of quiche had cheered me. 

"Certainly I'm right," said Bingo. "Even Helen of Eton's day passed." 

"Yes," I said. "That one autumn when he came back twice his original size and rather spotty. The scales fell from everyone's eyes, what?" 

"And, of course," said Bingo, "when he did, he gave Mad-dog Gaffleigh quite the drubbing." 

"Did he?" I said. "Why?" 

Bingo looked at me, the old eyebrows reaching for the sky as if they'd been threatened in an American Western. "The Battle of Troy, of course, Bertie." 

"The what?" 

Gussie gave a sort of pitying snort. "The Battle of _Troy_ , Bertie. Even _I_ know about that." 

"Well, you were more or less on the front lines, weren't you, Gussie?" said Bingo, and they both nodded knowingly. 

"What on earth are you two drivelling about?" I said. 

"Good Lord, Bertie," said Bingo. "You can't possibly have missed it? It was the talk of the school for ages. You would've--oh, but you were out for about a month, that year, weren't you? Right before summer holidays. Pox, wasn't it?" 

"Yes," I said, stiffening. 

"Rather late in life," said Gussie. 

"You might say that," I said coldly. It occurred to me to comment that he was the last person in my acquaintance by whom I wished to be lectured on late development, but we Woosters are a gallant clan, so I bit the lip. 

"So you missed the whole thing," said Bingo with a sort of wonder in his voice. "Imagine that. Missed the Battle of Troy." 

"Because of the chicken pox," Gussie agreed, and they nodded and 'ahhed' together for a while. 

"I _am_ glad that's sorted out for you," I said. "I would hate for either of you to be labouring in the dark, as it were." Bitter, perhaps, but Bertram felt he was being sorely tried. 

Bingo seemed to get the g. "It was Hawtrey House, Bertie." 

"Ah?" 

"You remember, don't you, beforehand? Old Eddie was in Villiers, with us, so we were the Spartans." 

I inclined the bean--it seemed to help others of a more intellectual bent when they were casting the lines back into the great sea of memory, but it did me no good. "Can't say as I do, Bingo." 

"Well, we were. And Walpole decided to be Athens, and I think Baldwin's Bec might've taken Crete..." 

This was getting complex. I'd had no idea the boys were taking such an active interest in ancient history. "Right," I said, cutting him off before he listed any more cities. "But this war?" 

"Well, the Houses who'd chosen the Greek side were the defenders of Helen, yes?" said Bingo. "And they sort of pitched in when other boys were giving Eddie a hard time--" 

"Pinching and such," I offered. 

"Exactly, yes. And then Mad-dog, the blighter, got his House up as the Trojans, and decided to really reenact the whole story, as per spec., you know." 

"I'm a little hazy on the details, Bingo," I said. "How do you mean?" 

"They kidnapped Helen," said Bingo. "That is to say, Eddie." 

"What!" 

"Managed to sneak in during House Prayers, and hauled him off in a sack or something." 

"Never!" 

"They did," Gussie averred. "Dickens of a row. Gaffleigh's room was next to mine." 

"But that's Hawtrey House for you," said Bingo with a sniff, "through and through." 

" _I_ was in Hawtrey," said Gussie, giving Bingo the fish-eye. 

Bingo smiled contritely. "Well, yes, but you're all right, Gussie." 

"Hm!" 

"Hawtrey did take Sports Day three years in a row," I offered. This business of insulting a fellow's school House is a prickly one. Even a poop might be roused to rash acts. 

"Yes, we did," said Gussie, tilting up the old schnozz a bit. I thought he would add, "so there!" and perhaps a juicy raspberry for good measure, but he showed admirable manly restraint. 

" _Any_ how," continued Bingo, "they hauled Eddie off and imprisoned him, it seems, in Mad-dog's room. When the rest of us in Villiers found him gone, we had to wait till Lights Out, then we went round and gathered the rest of the Greek Houses and stormed Troy. Hawtrey, that is." 

"How do you mean, stormed?" 

"Just that, old thing! Went charging in as a great mob, under cover of darkness. Charged up the stairs like the bally Light Brigade, burst down the door and carried off our Housemate, victorious." 

"It wasn't so simple as that," said Gussie. 

"Well, if you insist," said Bingo, a sour note entering his voice at being corrected. "It took rather longer than that. And the prefects and the House Master, Dame, and the Maid were all on us. It was swarming with masters before long, grabbing boys, breaking up fights." 

"There were split lips and black eyes everywhere," said Gussie. "Seemed like half the boys were absent from lessons the next day." 

"My sainted aunt!" I said. I wasn't certain whether to be thoroughly pipped I had missed such a grand bit of public school mayhem, or relieved. The thought of crowds of masters, still in dressing gowns and nightcaps, roused from bed in the dead of night by general anarchy of the Houses rather made the old public school boy's heart swell. On the other hand, while the Woosters of old no doubt found their greatest joy facing odds of several hundred unbelievers to one _preux chevalier_ , the line's ideas of a jolly evening out had been somewhat refined over the years, and when I tell you that Hawtrey House usually rose to victory on Sports Day on stepping stones of the mangled corpses of the more academically inclined Houses strewn liberally about the rugby field, you will understand why I might not have been keen to beard them in their den. 

"You can say that again," said Bingo. 

He had a point. "My sainted aunt," I said. "I suppose I can see why Eddie felt the need to reopen certain subjects when he got that growth spurt." 

"Finished off by bunging Mad-dog in the swimming pool and holding him under. Took half the House just to pull him off." 

"I say," I said. "Perhaps that was a bit of an overreaction?" 

"No," said Gussie, "not really." 

Bingo looked at him keenly. "Yes, you were next door, Gussie." 

Gussie turned his glass of orange juice in his hands, then took a bracing draught. "Mad-dog had gotten a bit too far into character, I think," he said, frowning gravely. "Method acting, maybe--he always was a bit crazy for the plays and pantomimes--and, well, he fancied himself Paris, this time." 

I furrowed the brow. "I thought you said Troy." 

"Paris was the name of the bloke who carried off Helen to marry her himself. He was _from_ Troy," said Gussie. He didn't add, "you idiot," but I could hear it waiting in the wings. 

"All right," I said. 

From the way Gussie now raised his eyebrows and widened his eyes at me--giving him rather the expression of a bass caught by his wife with a sturgeon--I could tell he meant me to read more into his cryptic mythological allusions, but I was at a loss. 

Bingo got there first. "You don't mean--!" he said in an awed whisper. He leaned in, and I leaned in as well. 

Gussie shook his head, a pained expression on the dial. "There were noises," he said, in much the same way you would expect a man to tell you about the body discovered floating in the pond. 

"I don't--" I said. 

"Bertie, you chump," said Bingo. "Paris took Helen to be his wife, you see?" 

I looked at him. Then I looked at Gussie, who seemed caught in a frightening reverie. I rather wanted to shake his shoulder to bring him out of it. I looked at Bingo again. Paris, Helen; Mad-dog, Eddie; Kidnapping, wife. "Good Lord," I said. "Not... Oh, good Lord." 

It just goes to show, if you follow me, the dangers of a classical education.


	4. Chapter 4

"How's the old Viking blood, Jeeves?" I asked, when he brought me my nightcap that p.m. 

"Sir?" 

"Is it rising? Calling you off to the high seas? Singing sea chanties in your ear, sending you dreams of striding the rolling deck and casting your nets, sort of thing?" 

"Not particularly, sir." 

"Ah." 

"Will that be all, sir?" 

"Er... hang on, Jeeves. Is there nowhere you wish to go? Nowhere the fish are biting especially well just now?" 

"Being in the winter months as we are, sir, most of my favourite fishing spots would be inhospitable at the moment. If you are considering a vacation, sir--" 

"Yes, Jeeves? You have a suggestion?" 

"Well, sir, if you propose departing within the next month, I wonder if you might excuse me from accompanying you." 

"Oh," I said, sagging somewhat at the shoulders. "Why?" 

"The Junior Ganymede Club is considering new candidates for membership, and I have been asked to sit on the committee. Meetings will be held weekly throughout the month." 

"I see." I bit the lip. "I don't suppose you could get out of it?" 

"I would prefer to sit, sir. Last year I was not entirely in agreement with the committee's decisions, and I would prefer, if possible, to avert further ill-advised admissions." 

"I'd wager you weren't on the committee when Brinkley was put up, eh, Jeeves?" 

Jeeves pursed the lips slightly and raised the eyebrows. His sensory--incensed--censorious, that's the baby--his censorious look. "Precisely, sir. Most unfortunate." 

"Well, quite," I said with a sigh. "I applaud your dedication to the guild. Never mind, then." 

"If you wish to take a trip, sir, no doubt a suitable temporary replacement can be found." 

"For you, Jeeves?" I said. "No. Pale shadows, yes. Incompetents, yes. Raving lunatics, certainly. But replacements, never." 

Jeeves inclined the coconut humbly, the faintest hint of a smile sneaking round the edge of his lips, only to be chased off for its pains. "It is very kind of you to say so, sir. But about your holiday--" 

"It will wait," I said. "No, it was just a thought. I wouldn't think of going on a cruise without you, anyhow. I know how you enjoy them." 

"Thank you, sir." 

"Well, good night, then, Jeeves." 

"Good night, sir." 

He switched out the light and pushed off to work whatever miracles it is he works after I roll up the sleave of care, or whatever it is I'm meant to do with it; making the flat safe for man and beast--although mostly man, really--after I've done with it. But the sleave of care was rather longer than usual, and rolling it no simple matter. My first, and what had seemed a rather promising, plan was scattered to the four winds, but one must soldier on. The ancient Woosters had come over with the Conqueror, and though I was unclear on precisely what they'd done afterwards, I was certain it wasn't to fold up the tents and leg it when one piffling plan went south. 

What faced me was a general's dilemma. The campaign: shield the reactionary sensibilities of one hidebound valet, viz., Jeeves, from the attentions and missives of the currently Hellenistic Drones and any knowledge of their activities for as long as said activities persisted. As Bingo had pointed out, their interest couldn't last so terribly long. All it wanted was a little finesse to weather it. 

I sighed. What a campaign that wanted finesse wanted, of course, was Jeeves's touch, but this was a task for Bertram and Bertram alone. It was up to the young master to defend the peace of his household, and come Hell or hayfever, defend it he would. 

* * *

For the next few days, I gave the Drones Club a wide berth. I met Bingo twice for lunch, and otherwise I amused myself with solitary pursuits, chiefly the theatre and my mystery novel. It was beginning to look as though Avery Jones's lady client herself was the murderer, which would fit the pattern of most of my dealings with the fairer s. Deadlier than the m., don't you know. Although my present worries were occasioned by a largish herd of the m. of the s. To all things a balance, I suppose. 

The second time I saw Bingo, he informed me Gussie was considering taking a flat in London. No good could come of that, I thought, and sure enough, there was a telegram on my breakfast tray the next morning. That was Jeeves's tact at work, you see. A lesser man might have brought it to me with my tea, but Jeeves knows better. Fortified though I was with tea, I was still not inspired by the sight of the envelope to leap from 'twixt the sheets and dance. I was still less so once I had absorbed the contents, as follows: 

  
_Bertram Wooster_  
_Berkeley St._  
_London W1_

_Dreadfully sorry bruise your tender feelings thus but am at wits' end. Not seen Augustus since left for London one week ago for day trip. No word. Worried sick. Know it hurts you ever so but beg you to discover what has become of him. Know I may depend on your beautiful chivalrous soul._

_Madeline_

  
"Steep," I muttered. 

"Sir?" Jeeves inquired. I looked up, somewhat startled, as I could have sworn he had floated out after depositing my eggs and b. Without thinking, I handed over the telegram. Directly I had, I felt that I had put my foot in it, but it was too late. I watched him scan the message, his well-chiselled features betraying no emotion. He handed the telegram back to me. "Most disturbing, sir." 

"You think so, too, eh?" I said. Naturally, Jeeves would perceive the Bassett angle of the situation, having encountered the beast before. The situation, I mean, not Madeline. If I could keep his attention focussed on that aspect, perhaps it was safe enough to involve him. 

"Yes, sir. It might be prudent to pursue the course of action Miss Bassett has suggested _vis-à-vis_ Mr. Fink-Nottle." 

"Hunt him up, you mean." 

"Indeed, sir. Miss Bassett's periods of disillusionment with Mr. Fink-Nottle have thus far resulted in difficulties for yourself, sir. Averting another would, I fancy, be wise." 

"Well, the hunting has been done, Jeeves," I said. "Gussie is staying at the Langham; I saw him not five days ago. And there is nothing the matter with him. Nothing much, anyhow." 

"Did Mr. Fink-Nottle confide in you the reason for his extended stay in the city, sir?" 

"Well, ah... Not as such. But from a, er, psychological standpoint..." 

"Yes, sir?" 

"I think he's fed to the teeth with Madeline. Again." 

"Then he is unwilling to return to Totleigh Towers, sir?" 

If his recent interest in local real estate was any indication... "I think so, Jeeves. I mean," I added hurriedly, "I shouldn't read anything too sinister into it. Gussie's been cooped up in Lincolnshire for years, and then just when he begins to come out of his shell and stretch his wings and whatnot, he gets whisked away to Totleigh-in-the-Wold, which is practically as bad. Maybe he just wants to see a bit of what he's been missing. Experience a bit of the nightlife, take the bachelor experience for a spin and all that." 

"Quite possibly, sir." Jeeves looked thoughtful. 

I looked at the remains of my eggs and b. I scooped up a pensive forkful and let the brain work a bit more. It was daunting to think of the Wooster grey matter racing with the Jeeves model. A tortoise and the hare situation if ever there was one. 

"If I might make a suggestion, sir?" 

"Certainly, Jeeves." 

"Mr. Fink-Nottle's retiring nature is not well-suited to city life, sir. I think that if he is left at liberty to experience the lifestyle which you yourself and many of the other young gentlemen of his acquaintance so enjoy, he will come to the same conclusion which he did originally upon leaving university, that is to say, that a quiet life in the country is what he most desires." 

"Really?" 

"I fancy so, sir, yes. Mr. Fink-Nottle's previous attempts to alter his personality, whether to become more assertive, or more outgoing in matters of... the heart, have always ended with a return to the _status quo_." 

"Once a poop, always a poop, eh, Jeeves?" 

"I would not have used that phrasing, sir, but yes. In light of which, my thought is to allow Mr. Fink-Nottle time to reach that same realization without endangering yourself, to which end, I would suggest dispatching a telegram to Miss Bassett in Mr. Fink-Nottle's name, and another under your own, shortly afterwards, to substantiate the contents of the first." 

"Ah, I follow you, Jeeves! Right, take a telegram, then." Jeeves pulled a small notebook and pencil from the inside pocket of his jacket and stood at the ready. "As follows," I said. "Madeline. Unavoidably detained by newt epidemic. Dumb chums in devil of state. Thinking of you always, not alongside newts, understand, but foremost in thoughts and heart. Love, Augustus. That should put her off the scent, what?" 

"I think so, sir. Though, if I might suggest, instead of 'dumb chums'--" 

I waved a hand. "Dress it up as you like, Jeeves, I shall leave it to your whatsit." 

"Discretion, sir?" 

"Yes. What about this second telegram you said I should send?" 

"One from yourself, sir, in answer to Miss Bassett's. Perhaps you could allude to this 'epidemic' as well." 

"To back up the _faux_ -Gussie's story." 

"Yes, sir. I think sending it tomorrow would be best, but I can take your message down now." 

"Alright, have it say: Madeline. Never fear. Watchful eye duly on Gussie. He has been closeted in hotel attempting to save dying newts, much distressed, sensitive plant that he is. Seems newts too sick to move. At first improvement, Gussie will return to Totleigh Towers. Bertie. Will that do, Jeeves?" 

"It should meet the case, sir." 

"Oh, wait, add this on: Gussie's troubled brow in need of soothing upon return. To stir the maternal instincts and so forth." 

"Well, sir..." 

"No good? Not strong enough?" 

"The opposite, sir. I wonder if that might not prompt Miss Bassett to come to Mr. Fink-Nottle's aid immediately, rather than awaiting his return." 

"Oh. Quite the wrong stuff, then. Strike it from the record. In fact, perhaps we should bung something into Gussie's telegram, saying that the newt plague could spread to humans, too. But then she might worry that Gussie wasn't safe, either. Er..." 

"I will adjust the telegrams, sir," said Jeeves, "in order to produce the desired effect." 

"Oh. Right, then. Yes, I suspect you're the man for the job, anyhow, Jeeves. Carry on." 

Jeeves flowed out and I finished my breakfast in a more cheerful mood. This aspect of my Gussie-trouble, at least, was squared away. I could not lay the whole of it before Jeeves, but it was pleasant to feel that while part of my endeavours remained cloaked in secrecy, master and man were still working together. 

  
  
In the afternoon, I chanced a look in at the club. It was busier than it had been since the last darts tournament. There were faces I hadn't seen there in ages, and, it seemed to me, a certain furtive aspect touched those faces when I greeted them with a cheerful "What ho." Conversations seemed to stop when I approached, that sort of thing. I slid off an hour or so later with a rummy feeling. 

It was the same when I met Bingo there for dinner two nights later: small knots of Drones deep in conversation, who gave me the fish-eye when I came close. Similar a few days later, just before lunchtime, only with fewer Drones about, and this time I saw Gussie in amongst them, chatting with Catsmeat and two others whose names I was hazy on. Gussie's society has a tendency to bring Catsmeat out in a rash, so I slid over to rescue the poor blighter and as I hove alongside him, he shoved something that looked like a book behind his back. 

"Hallo, Gussie, Catsmeat... er... Hallo, all," I said. "What's that, Catsmeat?" 

"What's what?" 

"That book?" 

"Oh, er... nothing." 

"I haven't seen you touch a book since we revised for exams at Oxford," I said. 

"Unlike some," said Catsmeat, "I do crack open a book that doesn't have 'murder' in the title now and again." He gave a tense laugh and a look that fell short of Gussie's budgerigar-digestion model, but only because Gussie was using it at the moment and, I can only assume, had already written away for the patent. "Besides," he said, "it's never too late, eh?" 

"Too late for what?" I asked. 

Catsmeat fidgeted a bit with his collar and shuffled his feet. "Well. Er," and his voice fell so low on the next word that it seemed to travel through the air at half speed, "self-improvement... sort of thing." 

I squinted at him for a moment, waiting for the word to swim its way upstream to my brain--by way of Egypt, I think. "Great Scott," I said. "Catsmeat, you don't mean... You're not reading... an _improving_ book?" 

"It's something I had off Madeline," Gussie interjected, saving Catsmeat some more squirming. I looked back and forth between the two, open-mouthed. 

"My God, man," I said to Catsmeat. "You're reading that willingly?" I aimed an accusing look at Gussie, then thought better of it. Whatever one says of him, Gussie is simply not what one looks for in a brazen blackmailer. "What is it?" I asked. 

Catsmeat shifted the book behind him, so as to more securely shield it from my view. "Not telling," he said. 

"It must be beastly," I said, more alarmed by the second. "Gussie, what on earth have you done to him?" 

"I--" Gussie started, indignant. 

"He hasn't done anything," Catsmeat cut in, puffing up his chest and tilting up his chin, "but open my eyes to my own unworthiness." 

"Unworthiness?" I repeated. Catsmeat, like any man, has his faults, and one of his happens to be that he doesn't admit that fact. "Unworthiness of what?" 

"Of..." A faint pink crept into the chap's cheeks, driving the iron into my soul. "Of Jeeves, if you must know," he sniffed. 

Round about there, I stopped. Not so much a conscious decision to freeze, or a woodland creature's clever instinct to play dead when confronted by a larger and toothier neighbour; the Wooster grey had simply overheated like the engine of a motor car crossing the noontime Sahara in August, and left me staring at these two rather large blots on the landscape, with the two other specimens hovering like a mirage in the background, with steam no doubt pouring out my ears. This was a spot of good luck, because if the brain hadn't called for an immediate shutdown of the whole Wooster apparatus, the body might have done something rash, viz., leaping about the room rolling the eyeballs and yelping for the police, and this would rather have given the game away. In the time it took for the area above my collar to resume operation as normal, Gussie and the other two eggs had begun to commentate... commissary... dash it, to gas on in sympathy with Catsmeat's aspirations to become worthy of Jeeves's many virtues, noticing nothing out of the ordinary about my glassy-eyed stare. When I came back to myself, they were paying me no mind at all, so I sidled away, mumbling something about getting another drink, then legged it from the club as though all the eligible women of good stock in England were snapping at my heels. 

Steep. As Jeeves would say, approaching the perpendicular. 

* * *

After that incident, wild horses could not have dragged me back to the Drones Club. Actually, I rather fancy they could have, but the point was I really didn't want them to. Luckily, none tried. When I was a lad, I had gone about in fear of these marauding herds of wild horses, poised to ambush the unwary and drag them places for motives unknown but no doubt sinister. Eventually, I was informed that it was a figure of speech, and anyways that there were no wild horses for miles round our village. As it happens, they are fairly rare in London, as well. For a week and a half I was left in peace to carry out Bingo's waiting-it-out plan. Jeeves's palliative measures _in re_ Madeline had borne fruit in the form of a telegram from same, going on about Gussie's kind soul and my stoutness in acting in their interests when it was my fondest desire to cut the wedding cake hand in hand with Madeline, myself. This cheered me, as it seemed to indicate that there was world enough and time for Gussie's madness to run its course without landing me in the soup. 

I little knew. 

Bingo telephoned after dinner on Sunday. 

"Bertie, I think you had better come round the Drones." 

  
  
The club was as full of people as Oxford Street on a holiday afternoon. A newt would have found it a challenge to travel from the vestibule to the bar without being shouldered or treading on toes; for me it was impossible. Bingo met me at the door and we squeezed and pardon-me-ed our way through together. The conversations we passed through on the way chilled the blood. 

"I saw him in Kensington High Street yesterday. Going into a tailor's. What impeccable taste he has!" 

"I heard from my uncle's man how he tricked the old buzzard into doubling the man's salary, all by..." 

"I've heard he plays darts sometimes at the Book and Beech. I've been down every night this week..." 

"Do you suppose he'd approve of these spats?" 

I looked at Bingo the way one character looks at another in a mystery novel when they have just opened the door to find a hooded figure with a largish knife on the doorstep. He nodded grimly. "It's Jeeves they're talking about, old thing. Two brandy and sodas." This last as we washed up at the bar like a pair of beached whales. 

McGarry, the bartender, served up the restoratives without comment and retired to a corner of the bar to polish a glass. It seems to be a distinguishing mark of the breed--of bartenders, that is--some sort of hereditary defect, perhaps. Leave them without a glass near to hand, and they'll go about polishing everything they can get their hands on: doorknobs, hatstands, the elderly. Best to let them have free reign behind a bar, all things considered. Bingo and I availed ourselves of two empty bar chairs and for a moment we drank and surveyed the scene in silence. 

Simply teeming with humanity it was. The air was filled with a low hum, the kind of noise only dozens and dozens of simultaneous quiet conversations can produce. No one was playing bread-roll cricket or batting shuttlecocks into the light fixtures. The billiards tables in the smoking room, I had a feeling, would be neglected. This, it seemed to me, was what was meant by the great unshaven masses. That is, well, they were shaven, actually, aside from a moustache here and there, but that was the feeling of it. A horde is what they were. A great bally horde of Huns and Visigoths... or, perhaps more to the point, Trojans. 

"They can't all be Drones," I said. "Surely there aren't so many of us?" 

"No," said Bingo, "a lot of them are guests of members, it seems." 

"This is your idea of blowing over, then, is it, Bingo?" 

"Well, what do you expect out of an idea of mine, really?" 

"Fair play," I admitted. "I'm buying, I suppose?" 

"Jolly decent of you." 

"Think nothing of it. What's become of Gussie, by the by?" 

"In the dining room, last I spotted him. Probably up on a table giving inspirational speeches, by now." 

"I thought he'd repented stirring them up," I said, "but last week here he was, mingling away, and _now_ \--" 

"Get a quart of orange juice into the old boy and he loses all sense of proportion." 

"Ha!" said I. "Proportion, forsooth! The newt is the father of the man." 

"The child, you mean, Bertie." 

"No, the newt. It is all the fault of this dastardly amphibian. Ah, Bingo, had we but known back at Eton that it would come to this!" I gestured vaguely at the throng of Jeeves-admirers. "I should have smashed his tanks then and thrown the little beggars in the lake." 

Bingo sighed and patted me on the back. "Here now, Bertie. You couldn't have guessed. No one could." 

I shook my head and smiled a bitter one as I waved to McGarry for a second round. "What price our youthful _naiveté_ , Bingo? Where does this madness end?" 

"I suppose you'll have to put your foot down." 

"My foot?" 

"Yes. Go in there and set them straight." 

"Me." 

"Yes." 

"How, exactly?" 

"Go in there and tell them what's what, what?" 

"What?" 

"Er." 

"This is another Bingo original, then?" 

"Yes, well." Bingo frowned at his b. and s. "I wish we could consult Jeeves. He'd soon have the situation sorted." 

I heaved a deep and soulful. "I wish we could, too. But we can't. Let there be no confusion. Jeeves discovering this state of affairs represents a crisis in mine. It is not to happen." 

"Then you've got to do it yourself. Go sort them out, Bertie." 

"Yes, well. The problem with that idea is that I haven't the foggiest what has possessed them--" 

"Yes, you have." 

"No, I mean besides... Besides whatever it is you're on about. I mean this return to schoolboyish tendencies _in re_ their fellow men. Why now? Why _my_ valet?" 

"Well, the answer to that is Gussie." Bingo tapped his temple, raising his eyebrows meaningly. "Strategy, Bertie. You must outgeneral their general. Then the troops will be demoralized." 

I was sceptical. I told him so. He signaled for a third round and restated his point. 

"What have you to lose, Bertie?" 

"Everything," I said, "if I lose Jeeves." 

"Which is precisely why you must make a stand! What would your Crusader ancestors have done?" 

This struck a chord. "By Jove, you're right, Bingo. Come on." 

"Oh, er... I'm coming, too, am I?" 

"Yes. What would _your_ ancestors have done?" 

"I'm not sure the Littles were in the Crusades." 

"Certainly they were. And I've never known a Little to abandon an old school chum." 

"Well, but Bertie..." 

"Besides, you put him up for membership." 

"Oh," sighed Bingo, "all right, then." 

We dismounted our tall chairs somewhat more carefully than we had climbed up, and elbowed our way to the dining room, a pair of Daniels bound for the lions' den.


	5. Chapter 5

The dining room was packed like a tin of sardines, but it was not quite the Spode-style political rally Bingo had led me to fear. A tiger can't change his spots, after all: Gussie is just not the sort of chap to exhort people from high places. He was, however, in conference with a large group of eager listeners seated round one of the tables, among whom I spotted Catsmeat, Barmy, and Beefy Bingham. 

"Great Scott, Bingo," I hissed, "it's spread to the clergy!" 

Bingo pushed me forward. "Courage, Bertie old man. Remember the Crusades." 

I found myself abruptly in amongst Gussie's circle, standing between Beefy and Barmy. I cleared my throat, rather like Jeeves does when he wants to speak, but no one has given him the opening, only I fancy I did it less delicately, because Beefy asked me if I needed a handkerchief or a glass of water. 

"Ah, no, thank you, Beefy," I said. Everyone at the table was giving me a rather rummy look. I might have been moved to retreat at this point, but Bingo hit me in the back of the legs with a chair at just the right angle and force that I fell into it. A kind word of encouragement would have sufficed, but he chose brute force... Well, no matter. I cleared my throat again. "Actually, Gussie, I wanted a word." 

Gussie had quite lost his budgerigar look. He wasn't ashamed at all of the mess he'd made, the blighter. It put me somewhat bitterly in mind of the incident, not so very long past, of his little notebook of insults. "All right, then, Bertie, what is it?" Patronizing, his tone was. That's the very word. 

"Well, Gussie," I said, glancing to the side where Bingo had pulled up a chair and was giving me a meaning look, "I'd like to talk this whole... er... Jeeves, er, admiration... thingummy through with you." 

Gussie smiled and waved a hand like a king. "Say on, Bertie, we talk of little else here, lately." 

His manner rankled not a little, but we Woosters can wear the mask. "Well, Gussie," said I, and for a moment my mind spun like a bicycle that's just gone off a cliff--wheels turning, but getting nowhere, don't you know. Then I had a bit of a whatsit. A Eureka-type moment. _Sans_ bathwater. "You know how keen Jeeves is on philosophy and philosophers and all that," I said. 

"Oh, yes," said Gussie. The others nodded. 

"Those question-asking chappies," I said, "always on about the whys and wherefores of everything, you know." 

"I know what a philosopher is," said Gussie. 

"Of course," I said. "Just clarifying. So, of course, you like that sort of thing, too, eh? Getting at the guts of things, taking it all apart to see what makes it tick, and that sort of lark?" 

"I suppose so, yes," said Gussie. "Yes, certainly. It's so admirable, the way Jeeves does that, don't you think? Very intellectual. Not to merely skate on the surface of things, but to really delve beneath--" 

"Yes, quite," I said. "So you wouldn't mind if we had a go at it now. Delving beneath, I mean. Philosophically." 

"No, of course not," said Gussie, though a suspicious glint entered his fish-like eye. "What about?" 

"Oh, the most important matter of the day, of course," I said. I leaned back in my seat and looked round the table, letting the suspense gather. Some of the rest of the smoking room crowd had sidled up behind those seated, perhaps because they knew me as the employer of their idol--rummy thought, that, being thought of second-hand that way. "I think we should plumb the depths of your interest in Jeeves," I said. 

"It's love, Bertie," said Gussie, and I repressed a shudder, "pure and simple." 

"Yes, all right," I said, "but I think Jeeves would be rather insulted at such... devotion if you hadn't, er, well, considered it properly. I mean, it can't be worth much, can it, if it doesn't stand up to the least bit of logical questioning?" 

"He has a point," said Catsmeat. 

"Thank you," I said. "How about it, Gussie?" 

Gussie frowned and looked about. The assembled not-so-unshaven were watching him expectantly. He cleared his throat, loosened his collar, and sat up straighter in his seat. "Go on, then," he said. 

"Right," said I. I clapped my hands, rubbed my palms together, set my clasped hands on the table, cleared my throat and felt my eyes glaze over. 

Bingo brought his heel down on my foot under the table, bringing me back to life with a yowl. "Aaaaah," I yelped. "That is to say, ah. Er. Yes. Propriety. We'll start there, shall we?" 

"What of it?" said Gussie. 

"Well! Er. Jeeves is entirely devoted to it, you know. He's quite adamant on points of form and etiquette--what to wear at what time of day and year, the evils of monogrammed handkerchieves, how not to eat soup..." I was watching Gussie, but I distinctly saw two of the men standing behind him pull handkerchieves out of breast and side pockets and drop them to the floor. I thought I heard someone ask, "What _does_ he say is the right way to eat soup?" but the comment was drowned out by a swell of shushing. "Anyhow," I said, "what do you think Jeeves will think of all this? You are aware it's a bit irregular, a lot of young gentlemen holding conferences and so-forth to moon over a valet?" 

"He isn't simply a valet," Gussie sniffed. 

"Well, no," I agreed, "but the fact remains that he _is_ a valet, and rather a reactionary, at that. You, young Gussie, and all the rest of these fine fellows, are members of the aristocracy. I put it to you again, what do you think Jeeves would think?" 

"Jeeves is a great intellectual," said Gussie. "I'm sure he wouldn't be swayed by piffling public opinion to condemn a pure love." There was some nodding and appreciative muttering. 

"You may call it piffling public opinion," I said, "but Jeeves would call it tradition and propriety. The class distinction alone would have him in fits." 

Gussie frowned for a moment. "But surely," he said, "a man's worth is more important. Like in the song, by that poet chap." 

"Yes?" 

"Er... A man's a man for all that--" 

"Oh, a' that," I said. 

"What?" 

"It's Scottish." 

"All right, if you like," said Gussie. "At any rate, 'rank is but the tuppence stamp', I think it said, somewhere in there." 

"Guinea's stamp, actually," I said. 

"Guinea stamp?" 

"Yes." 

"Where on earth would you send a letter that it would need a _guinea_ stamp? China?" 

"Yes, that's rather what I thought," I said, "but I have it from Jeeves, so it must be right." 

"Fine, then," said Gussie, "Guinea stamp or what have you, the fact remains. Men of intellect don't let mere... accidents of birth muddy the issue." 

"Accidents of birth, eh?" Rather well put, that, I thought. I glanced at Bingo out of the corner of my eye. He was doing his best, I think, to look encouraging, but what would have done the trick a good deal more quickly than him waggling his eyebrows at me was a bit of note paper with the answers on. Truth be told, I wasn't so certain romance between different classes posed much problem to Jeeves's sensibilities--after all, he had brokered the marriages between my Uncle George and a former Criterion waitress, and between Bingo's uncle and his cook--but it was the first objection that had come to mind. 

"Of course," said Gussie. "I mean, Bertie, you were born into heaps of money, and Jeeves wasn't, but your brain's not a patch on his." 

"That's true," I admitted, "but neither here nor there--" 

"Isn't it?" Gussie asked, regarding me as if I were a fish egg and he a newt. "I think it's quite central to the issue. If you think Jeeves isn't worth our affections simply because of humble birth--" 

"See here!" I interrupted, the blood rising, red being seen and all that. "Jeeves is worthy of a good deal more than the so-called affections of you lot." It got right in amongst me, Gussie's implication that I didn't appreciate Jeeves's fine qualities. "Dash it, if there is anyone better placed than I to appreciate my own valet's intellect, tact, dress-sense, social acumen, or any other bally thing, I should very much like to meet him. To think--" 

"Well, there you are, then," said Gussie. 

"Eh?" 

"You don't think social standing is an obstacle to our admiration of Jeeves." 

"Ah--" I found my mouth hanging open with nothing useful issuing therefrom, so I closed it. 

Gussie smiled at me--a dreadful, self-satisfied sort of smile. I wondered if he weren't trying on that wheeze of Jeeves's again, and despising me as we sat there, dissecting my method of eating asparagus, or something even worse. "Nice talking philosophy with you, Bertie," he said. 

"Yes, right," I mumbled. I was about to push away from the table and retreat like Napoleon at Waterloo when Bingo applied his heel again, this time to my shin. 

I doubled over to clutch at my leg and Bingo hunched over to meet me. "Think of the Crusades, Bertie," he hissed. 

"I am," I whispered back. "Along the lines of, 'with Littles in the regiment, who needs the blighted infidel hordes?'" 

"Try another tack, old man, you can't retreat now. This is Gussie you're facing--Gussie. You fixed his collar for him until year seven!" 

He was right. "Bingo," I said, "you're right." I straightened the old spine, fixed Gussie with an unwavering gaze and said, "Aha!" It helps to lead in strong, you see. "But what do you--" 

"What were you doing under the table?" Gussie cut in. 

"Eh?" 

"You both ducked under there for about a minute." 

"Oh, er," said I. "Yes, I... had a cramp, or something, I expect. Dashed painful, but it's all right, now. As I was saying--" 

"So, what was Bingo doing?" 

"What's that?" 

"What did your cramp have to do with Bingo?" 

"I was talking him through it," said Bingo. "Tricky things, cramps. Handle them wrong and you can lose the whole leg." 

"No, you can't!" Gussie snorted. 

I put my fingertips to my temples and surveyed the scene. It was like something from a nightmare after a night of excess: the sea of staring faces, most of which unfamiliar, the transformation of a newt-fancying poop into a devil-may-care leader of men, the dialogue which ought to make sense but simply enters the head by way of the ear and splashes against the sides a bit, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing, sort of thing. Perhaps, I thought, it was a dream, after all. As Bingo and Gussie continued to bicker about the dangers of cramp, I pulled down my sleeve, got hold of a goodish piece of forearm and pinched for all I was worth. 

I hadn't engaged in much pinching, nor had I been the victim of any such, in a few changings of the calendar, and I misjudged the appropriate pressure. I let out a yelp, and all eyes turned once more to me, but neither the demonic Gussie, nor any part of the infernal tableau surrounding him, so much as flickered. "Hallo, again," I said, rubbing my forearm ruefully. 

"Yes, what is it Bertie?" 

"I--" I'd quite forgotten what it was I had been trying to say before. I floundered, if that's the word. In my desperation, I had another go at that casting the lines back into the sea of memory lark. This trouble had all begun at school, really. If only the masters had taught us something to help deal with such eventualities. Of course, even if they had, chances are I wouldn't have remembered. All I'd ever been much good at in school was... "Aha!" I said triumphantly. "It isn't allowed in the Bible! You're being... er... whatsit!" I waved a finger. "Sacred. No... sacreligious. Sanctimonious. It isn't cricket, anyhow, men writing love letters to one another, and all that sort of thing, it says so in the Bible, so there. As you know, I won a prize at school for Scripture Knowledge and--" 

"Your blasted Scripture Knowledge prize," said Gussie with some heat. "I know for a fact you cheated on that test." 

"Cheated!" I said. "Look here, Gussie, what you say under the influence of gin and orange juice is one thing--" 

"Yes, that's right," Bingo said indignantly. "He never cheated on Scripture Knowledge. It was Maths." 

"What!" I cried. 

"Well, let's be honest, Bertie," said Bingo, "you can't count to _two_ without fouling it up." 

"That was never two!" 

"Hah," said Gussie. "So you're an all-round cheat. I knew it!" 

"You," I began, the nostrils flaring, "you... Your collar _still_ looks a mess!" 

"Oh!" said Gussie, turning pink. "That's fine, coming from someone who can't choose a tie without Jeeves's help!" 

His mention of Jeeves brought me up short like a snowball down the spine and returned my thoughts to the original purpose of this _tête-à-tête_. But I hadn't any more ammunition, after starting out with precious little. "Well," I said, "well..." and I paused to catch the breath and let the blood return to its usual temperature. Gussie seemed to do the same. "Well," I said again, throwing in with the third-time's-the-charm enthusiasts, "you're all idiots." And I meant this, I assure you, not as a base, childish insult, but merely as an objective statement of the facts. "What do you think you would have in common with a genius of Jeeves's level?" 

Gussie blinked. Then he frowned, and I saw the expression mirrored on the other faces gathered round the table. Finally, these troubled visages seemed to indicate, Bertram had made a salient point--if salient is the word. I looked at Bingo, and he raised the eyebrows, as if to say, "You've got them there, haven't you?" 

Just as I was beginning to feel that perhaps our campaign was won, and the bloodied soldiers could stagger home and have a go at some champagne, Catsmeat broke the brooding silence with a, "Yes, but," which filled me with a deep forboding. Slowly, I turned my head to face him, as did everyone else in the room. 

"Well," said Catsmeat, and from the gleam in his eye you could tell the young actor had some fruity lines to declaim, "didn't Plato say that love seeks what it has not? That is to say, weakness loves strength, strength loves gentleness, the ugly love the beautiful, and so on. In our case, we love intelligence, because we haven't got any." 

"Plato!" I cried, surging to my feet. I came away from Oxford with a degree in something or other, and so did Catsmeat, but there are limits. I mean to say, there was Plato, and Socrates and sometimes Aristotle, and what you learned at Oxford was that these fine, ancient fellows were neatly filed under Men After Whose Names You Nod Wisely. That was the extent of it. Someone quotes Plato, you put on a sort of knowing frown, nod, stroke the chin, and say, 'Of course, of course,' or some such. Nod and stroke, you see? Catsmeat, like me, should have been in the group of nodders, never--I say, never--in amongst the quoters. 

"I say, now, look here!" I said, but it was no good. Catsmeat had unleashed what I could only assume was the wisdom of old, not recently, or perhaps ever, having perused the tomes of old Plato, and all the others were falling right into line, folding brows and arms, nodding and chin-stroking, entirely won over. 

Matters had bypassed the perpendicular; they were now so steep they would have me walking the ceiling ere long. 

  
  
My way home is blurred in my recollection; I rather fancy it was blurred then, too. My mind was full of Catsmeat quoting Plato, and the bright, eager eyes of what I estimated to be the full membership of the Drones Club and a sizeable percentage of the men of W1, covetously watching my valet on his daily errands, perhaps even scaling the walls and peering into my very flat. 

I stumbled into the old domicile, slammed the door behind me, applied every lock I could put my hand to, and was casting a meaning eye on the sofa when Jeeves manifested himself from the direction of the kitchen and said, "Good evening, sir." 

"Jeeves," I gasped. "Why don't we have more locks?" 

"Sir?" said Jeeves. 

"Great big dungeon door-type things, Jeeves. And a bally great bar across the lot is called for, don't you think? Here we've put on a chain Aunt Agatha could snip through with her front teeth, and broken for tea!" 

Jeeves's eyebrow crept up an eighth of an inch. "I assure you, sir, our door is quite secure. Small though they may be, the two deadbolts employed are quite strong, and their moorings in the door jamb solid enough to ensure their efficacy. And if I may, sir?" he indicated respectfully that I should step aside, so I did, and he reached up to shoot another small bolt that moored the top right-hand corner of the door to the frame, and trod on another which went into the floor. "These additional bolts would render the door even more difficult to open. The hinges, as well, are reinforced and, as you can see, sir, reside on this side of the door so as to guard against tampering by anyone set upon burglarious entry." 

"You don't think we need to bung the sofa across there, then?" I asked. 

"No, sir." 

I drew a deep breath. "Very well, then. Oh, blast," I added, as another thought occurred. I raced round checking window latches and drawing curtains while Jeeves watched me with that one eyebrow raised, I think, a fraction higher. Having at last satisfied myself that the Wooster home was secure for the nonce--though there was a deuced scalable-looking drainpipe within an arm's reach of one of the south-facing windows that worried me--I sank onto the sofa like one breathing his last. "Jeeves," I called feebly, "one of your strongest." 

"Of course, sir," said the worthy fellow, and within moments a glass of the old familiar was floating before me on a silver tray. I took it reverently. "God bless you, Jeeves," I said by way of toast, and sent the o. f. to do its work. 

Somewhat braced, I replaced the glass on the tray and waved it away. I sat for some moments, allowing the grey matter to fizz and resettle itself after the restorative, before I realized that Jeeves was still standing at my side. I'd rather expected he would slide out to the kitchen again, or back to his lair, if he had done in the former. "Yes, Jeeves?" I asked. 

"Sir?" said Jeeves. "I thought you might require something further, sir. Your manner of entry led me to believe that something was troubling you." 

I gazed at the old chap fondly, a certain swelling of warmth in my breast. There, you see, was another reason I couldn't let him be carried off by the slavering masses of W1. Here he was, rallying round the young master without so much as a peep from me, positively bursting with the feudal spirit. But it was precisely because of that feudal spirit that I could not bring him in on my efforts. That is to say, here he was with every thought that God was on the thorn and all right with the social machine. If I were to tell him that the Helen of Eton fiasco was being played out again in W1, with grown men as all the Greeks and Trojans and Jeeves himself in the title role, well! Jeeves has been known to jump at cummerbunds. Confronted with such a show of the depravity of the upper classes, he might just give up valeting all together and go off to become a missionary in deepest Afric, or something. It was not to be counterbalanced... or counterfeited. Counte-somethinged, at any rate. I wasn't going to stick it, is what I'm getting at. "It's nothing Jeeves," I said, drawing on the ancient pride of the Woosters, the spirit of the _preux chevalier_ , much wear though that spirit had undergone that night. 

Jeeves tilted the coconut slightly to one side. "Sir, has something caused you concern regarding the security of our flat?" 

"Ah, well," I said. Of course, this was the disadvantage of Jeeves's keen powers of observation. Made it dashed hard to slip anything by him. "I was just at the Drones," I said, slowly as if I had a mouthful of treacle, stalling for time to find a good cover story. "And..." I said, "Catsmeat... said he'd had a burglary. At his flat." 

"Indeed, sir?" said Jeeves, raising the eyebrows. 

Simple solutions are the best, I've always said. 

"Indeed, Jeeves," I confirmed. "What's more, Bingo said he'd seen someone lurking about near his home, as well. There seems to be something of a crime wave in West-One." 

"Strange, sir." 

"Most disturbing, you might say." 

"Yes, sir. But, sir, strange in that no such occurrences have been reported in the newspaper, or on the wireless news." 

"Oh," I said. "I expect they're keeping it out of the papers, for now, so as not to precipitate a panic." I watched Jeeves nervously, trying to read the fellow's dial and determine whether or not he was buying it. "You know how excitable the neighbours are round here, Jeeves," I added. "It'd be dreadful for business, I suppose, if everyone were cowering under their beds, or running amok in the streets in a frenzy of nerves. The police probably want a chance to solve the case without all that rannygazoo cluttering up the walkways, I think." 

Jeeves pursed the lips slightly. "As you say, sir, most disturbing." 

"Yes, I thought so," I agreed. "Hence my manner of entry." 

"I understand entirely, sir." Jeeves looked thoughtful for a moment. "I believe our current security arrangements will continue to prove ample. If it will further allay your misgivings, sir, I shall leave the doors to the kitchen, rear corridor, and my own room open, so as better to convey sound from the flat. I sleep very lightly, and would be awoken immediately, were anyone to attempt to gain entry." 

"Oh, no need for that, Jeeves, surely." 

"It is no trouble, sir. I should be remiss if I spared any effort to ensure your sound night's rest." 

"Hm," I said. I regarded Jeeves, standing at attention, ready and willing to fling himself in the path of marauders, burglars and sundry for the sake of the young master and was struck reluctantly by the fact that Gussie had got a point, if a drippy one, _in re_ Jeeves's Herculean strength and fortitude. If there was anyone in England who bore so strong a resemblance to Hercules in a tailcoat, handsome of feature, keen of eye and broad of shoulder, with back straight and chest swelling with duty, prepared at a moment's notice to wrestle serpents and collar Hades himself, well, I had yet to meet him. Gussie's simpering proclamations, while perfectly rotten in delivery, were, I was forced to admit, spot on as far as substance. It mitigated my current predicament not a whit, but there you are. 

"You really have something of the ancient hero in you, haven't you, Jeeves?" 

"It is most kind of you to say so, sir." 

"I don't suppose the Jeeveses of old were prominent dragon slayers, rescuers of damsels, that sort of thing?" 

"Not that I am aware, sir, though it is an attractive thought." 

"Yes," I said, and resolved never to mention it in front of Gussie. The results were not to be... whatsit. I put a hand to the brow. "Jeeves, if you would run my bath, I think I shall make an early night of it." 

"Very good, sir." 

  
  
Despite my best intentions to do so, however, I made more of an early morning than an early night of it. My bath did nothing to soothe my uneasy thoughts, and when Jeeves turned out my bedroom light and withdrew, visions of Gussie climbing in the south-facing window, Catsmeat leaping out at Jeeves from the back of a tailor's shop, and others, increasingly horrific, kept me tossing and turning, tangling the old sleave of care into a proper Gordian knot. It was only as the sky outside my bedroom window began to show warning signs of oncoming daylight that an idea occurred to me. It was not an elegant solution, nor was the execution thereof pleasant to contemplate, but it would, I thought, do the trick, with sufficient Wooster elbow grease. 

My mind settled on its grim purpose, I buried the head in the pillows to catch what few remained of my recommended eight before the ordeal that awaited me on the morrow.


	6. Chapter 6

There are times--and let me assure you, lest you fling this slim volume from you in righteous contempt and strike Bertram forever from your life, that these times are few and separated by goodish chunks of years--nonetheless, I say, there are times when I miss my fifth year Maths textbook. 

Fie! I hear you say. And well you may say it--not for Bertram those columns of figures, nor the fanciful assortments of numbers and letters, mystifyingly connected by equals signs when any right-thinking person can see there is no hint of parity in the environs. No, it isn't so much the equations themselves that cause a wistful note to enter the Wooster baritone, but the fact that Messrs. Blockley and Smythe, the authors of this particular book, clearly in a fit of benevolence brought on by drink or divine grace, decided to include the answers in the back. 

According to my Maths master, Prof. Endsdale, as black-hearted a scoundrel as ever donned the black robes and gave an undeserving boy five across the trouser seat with the business end of a yardstick for speaking out of turn in class, the point of the thing was to check one's work after honestly attempting the problems. My view on the matter was, better men had tread before me, much like King Wenceslas, and who was I to forge my own path? In the snowbound wasteland of fifth year mathematics, I tread me boldly in the footsteps of Blockley and Smythe. The bloodhound Endsdale always seemed to know, too, to the tune of further attentions from the yardstick. One thing I memorized unerringly that year was the width of that particular instrument. Too narrow by about a mile. 

But to return to the theme of the textbook--it occurs to me at times when I find myself making a bloomer in my personal affairs that if only Messrs. Blockley and Smythe had published a volume on life, treating questions such as "How shall I make a hit at the party?" and "What should I send Great Aunt Mildred for Christmas?" with the answers neatly printed at the back of the book, then the world we live in would be a better, kindlier place. 

Monday morning was one of those times. 

There I was, standing in my living room, across from Jeeves, and the thought was occurring to me like billy-o. If I had had this tome in my hands, the question whose answer I would hastily have sought was, "Why is my valet staring at me with a look on his map like a stuffed frog?" Closely followed by, "What the Dickens should I do about it?" 

But there was Jeeves, distinctly stuffed froggish, and there I was, _sans_ book, however devoutly I might wish otherwise. 

Then Jeeves said, "Very good, sir," in a tone that frosted the windows, and withdrew to the kitchen. 

Allow me to furnish you with the prelude. 

I had risen, with the aid of one of Jeeves's pick-me-ups, an hour before. Jeeves brought forth the tea and toast, the eggs and b., readied my morning splash and shave, and laid out my day's raiment. I, having availed myself of the aforementioned, emerged freshly shaven and suitably dapper into the living room and, in accordance with the plan of campaign I had devised the night before, asked Jeeves whether he had any errands to run which would take him outside the flat. 

He said he had. 

I asked him if he would be so good as to provide me with a list thereof. 

Here is where he set in with the stuffed frog impression. 

"Sir?" 

"A list, Jeeves. Of the errands. Which would take you outside the flat." 

I noticed a shift in his posture. Not quite a flinch, just a very subtle drawing up at the shoulders and chest. Directly I saw this, I knew I had stumbled--in the course of our long acquaintance, I have come to know these small signs of Jeeves's. He had barely moved, but I understood that a lesser man, moved as he so clearly was, would have leapt backwards, perhaps throwing up the arms. What I was missing was the wherefore of the situation. 

"You have never asked me to itemise my duties before, sir," said Jeeves. 

"Yes, well," I said, with an attempt at the airy tone, "just taking an interest, really. Doesn't do, does it, for the master of the house to be entirely disconnected from the mechanics of its running, what?" 

Jeeves lifted the eyebrows and breathed in through the nose. "I really couldn't say, sir." 

There was a pronounced sinking feeling about my midsection, but I managed to sound out another request, in what passed for a carefree manner, for that list, and as I mentioned earlier, Jeeves said, "Very good, sir," yanking the temperature of the metropolitan area down by about twenty degrees, and biffed off. 

Now, Jeeves and I have had our disagreements before, on the subject of socks, golfing trousers, cummerbunds, and matrimonial prospects, and on those occasions I have frequently stiffened the upper lip and put up with a certain coolness between us in order to maintain my position as master. Two men of iron will cannot live long in close proximity without occasioning some conflict, and the important thing at such a time is to stand firm and defend one's principles. Britons never, never, never shall be slaves, and all that. On this particular Monday, however, I was only out of bed at such an early hour on the strength of Jeeves's home remedy, my mind was prey to visions of Gussie and Catsmeat and exhausted besides from the exercise it had taken the night before, and in this weakened state, if you had asked me just then with whom I would rather take tea that afternoon, my Aunt Agatha or the chilly Jeeves, I should have had to give the matter honest thought. 

Jeeves was gone a few moments, with no sound from the kitchen, and I was struck with the conviction that if he didn't come out, I would need a bracer before following him. Just then, the door swung open and he emerged with a small sheet of paper. He handed it over with a stiff nod and asked, "Will that be all, sir?" 

I was very nearly frozen to the spot. "No, wait a moment, Jeeves," I said. "I feel sure you've misunderstood me somehow." 

"Indeed, sir?" 

"Yes, indeed, dash it," I said. "There is a distinct soupiness in your tone and bearing at present, Jeeves, and I'm not sure what I've done to deserve it." 

Jeeves lifted the eyebrows again. "I am sorry if my manner has displeased you, sir." 

"No, don't apologise," I said. "It's this list, isn't it? I understand the what--it's the wherefore I'm foggy about, but I'm sure whatever it is, it isn't what you think." 

"It is not my place, sir, to question how you choose to run your own household." 

"I'll disagree with you there, Jeeves. It is precisely your place, since said running is done exclusively by you. So question you may, and if question you won't, I shall answer you anyhow. The fact is, I desired this list of you--" 

Jeeves inclined the coconut. "Yes, sir?" 

I came within a toucher of blurting out the whole thing. What stayed my hand--or rather, my lips--was the recollection of that miserable summer in Chuffnell Regis, when Jeeves and I had parted brass rags over the late Wooster trombone. I keenly remembered the feeling that I was living in a bleak, sunless world, into which the eye of heaven might never peep again. Therefore I girded the loins, gave the gentleman's code the elbow, and told a deliberate untruth. "I have a bet," I said. 

"A bet, sir?" 

"Yes," I said. It has been necessary, from time to time over the course of my career as a _boulevardier_ , to bend the truth--occasionally, into knots. Unpleasant, certainly, but one does what one must. The idea of lying to Jeeves, however, brought the forehead out in beads of persp., because the danger of being found out was so very much greater. Compared to Jeeves, who can induce a young lord to bean a police officer in the eye, then inform his lady mother, without batting an eyelash, that her son has gone off to chokey voluntarily, Bertram is but a rank amateur, a mere babe-in-arms. Be that as it might, in desperate times the hour produces the man, or at least a fair approximation--to wit, myself. "A bet," I said. "With... Catsmeat. You know Mr. Pirbright, I think, Jeeves?" 

"Yes, sir. I have had the pleasure of attending two plays in which Mr. Pirbright performed--as Anthony in _My Shirt on It_ and Rudolpho in _Don't Look Left,_ sir." 

"The secondary romantic interest, no doubt?" 

"Yes, sir. Mr. Pirbright also sought out my counsel on a personal matter once before, if you recall, sir." 

"Ah, yes," I said. "That business with the bad reviews and the unfriendly director." 

"Yes, sir." 

"Quite," I said. "It had slipped my mind. Well, it _is_ that Mr. Pirbright, and he wagered that I couldn't do the third of your duties without wilting like a snowdrop in June." 

Jeeves's right eyebrow rose to the half of its modest daily allowance. "A colourful turn of phrase. Did you accept this wager, sir?" 

"Yes," I said, then was inspired further. "Or rather, no. Not quite that bet, but another very like. When I said I bet I could, Catsmeat said it was impossible, but that if I could do so, he could manage it for longer, and so the winner of this wager is he who can carry on with these tasks the longest." 

"I see, sir," said Jeeves. 

"To the tune of a hundred pounds from the loser." 

"A substantial wager, sir." 

"Er... yes. Well, there it is, what? Not quite what you were thinking, I'll bet." 

"As you say, sir, no." 

"So, er..." I lifted the list he had given me. "Would this about cover the third, do you think?" 

"Rather more, sir, today." 

"Oh, well," I said. "This will do, in any event. I was going out, anyhow, so this should all be very convenient, I should think." 

Jeeves's stuffed frog expression seemed to me to soften a bit, though not to dissipate. "If I may, then, sir," he said, "I shall offer a few suggestions as to the most efficient method of completing these tasks." 

"By all means, Jeeves, please." 

I attempted to make notes over the few minutes that followed, but I had the sensation of being back at Eton, feeling the rush of wind against my face as a lecture sped by me, words approaching at every angle but the one necessary to penetrate the developing grey matter of one Bertram Wooster. 

Eventually, Jeeves wound down, and I said, "Right ho, I'll be getting on, then." 

"Will you be taking lunch at home, sir?" 

"Ah... Well, you know best, Jeeves. Will I be finished before lunch time?" 

"No, sir." 

I gulped a bit. "Right, then. Keep the home fires burning and expect me... some time before dinner." 

"Very good, sir." 

He helped me into my coat and handed me my hat and the wicker basket he uses for marketing. I hung in the doorway, wishing I could expunge the stuffed frog number from the premises entirely, and for a moment I wavered. It is dashed disheartening, when one is fighting a foreign war, to feel that unrest is brewing on the home front. But the only thing worse than a chilly Jeeves was the thought of an absent one, so I hardened my resolve, bid him good day, and pushed off. 

* * *

I arrived at Covent Garden, the location of the greater part of the errands on Jeeves's list, and immediately reversed the action--that is to say, I staggered backwards and through the open doors of the first public house I found. The wide square which housed the market was packed so full of people, a man of my build might easily have lifted up his feet and been borne along by the human tide. I availed myself of a brandy and then of the house telephone and rang up Bingo. 

"Bertie! I was just about to call you. Oh, Bertie, she's the most wonderful girl--" 

"Who is?" 

"Her name's Joy. Have you ever heard such a perfect name? Joy incarnate is what she is, Bertie--" 

"A tender goddess?" I said dully. 

"My God, Bertie, have you met her?" 

"No, Bingo," I said, reigning in a sigh, "I know your tastes, that's all." 

"My tastes? No, Bertie, my record up till now won't tell you a thing about Joy. All those other girls I've dreamed I loved were mere shadows cast by the sunlight striking Joy. Her movements are like poetry, her glance is like fire, her--" 

"So," I interrupted, "I suppose you haven't time to meet me at Covent Garden Market?" 

"What for?" asked Bingo. 

"Vegetables and a rump roast, for a start," I said, frowning at my list, "and then about a thousand things I had no idea I or my flat required, and some... some of whose existence I was and am still completely unaware." 

There was a pause on the other end of the line. "Oh, Bertie," said Bingo reprovingly. "Don't tell me you spilled the beans to Jeeves and he turned in his portfolio." 

"No, no," I said. "Not yet, anyhow. It's... a longish story. Can you come?" 

"No," said Bingo, "I'm meeting Joy for tennis in an hour. And anyway, I wouldn't come even if I weren't. Going to market yourself, Bertie? You must be mad." 

"Not mad, but short on ideas," I said. "I couldn't tempt you into it with lunch?" 

"Not this time, Bertie," said Bingo, "but I'll tell you what--you can give me dinner at your flat." 

"Thanks awfully, Bingo." 

"Not at all," said he. "When you're in love, you just want to spread the sunlight all round, you see." 

"Bingo--" I began, but wiser counsels prevailed. There are two things for which one can absolutely count on Bingo: First, if he hasn't fallen in love with a girl at first sight, he won't give her a second glance in this world or the next; Second, once he has fallen in love, he will find the shortest, most efficient route to utter humiliation and mortification for everyone in the environs. That isn't so bad when he falls in love in the country; directly he does so in London, the entire city becomes a plague zone, a wasteland unfit for man or beast. My mission in Covent Garden was probably more secure for lacking one lovestruck Bingo Little, even if another set of shoulders to share the burden and help muscle through the many-headed would have lifted my morale a bit. "Enjoy tennis. I wish you both joy. The condition, that is, not the person. Wishing her herself might not... See you later, Bingo." 

  
  
Once more I strode into the Covent Garden Market square, like Childe Roland sidling up to the Dark Tower, that is to say, with the feeling it was all a bad business, but if it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well it were done quickly. 

The thing about these open air markets--with all their bustle, the crowds, the exotic smells, the general buzz of voices alternating with the rhythmic calls of vendors--is that they are jolly when one is dropping by and having a look round, just to take in the atmosphere, but when one has a specific errand, or, worse yet, a list of them, these markets are like unto the Demon Pit. 

As I alluded to before, the square was so thronged that it seemed the rest of London must have stood empty, populated only by ghosts and the occasional pigeon. How one located a specific stall in the midst of this chaos, except by means of Providence, was beyond me, so, trusting to Lady Luck, I stepped into the tide. 

The prevailing current was flowing counter-clockwise round the square, so I went with it, keeping an eye out for the items on my list. Only a few yards along, I spotted a butcher's stall, but when I attempted to make my way towards it, I was blocked by a tall, stout gentleman, then shoved forward by a pair of men in aprons moving at speeds above the legal limit for vehicles on country roads. When I did stumble out of the current, the butcher's stall was nowhere to be seen; I had washed up against a sort of fruit and dried-herbiage stall. The identity of the various clumps of what appeared to be dried grass or bundles of twigs was a mystery to me, and there was no fruit on my list, but, I thought, if there was anything here I needed, I had better find out, because the chances of my finding the place again, deliberately, were so slim as to make no odds. 

"Afternoon, love!" said the woman behind the stall. She was a motherly-looking woman in an apron with a lot of curly red hair. 

"Good afternoon," I said. I looked at her wares. They told me nothing. Several more people shouldered and elbowed their respective ways past me, causing me to stumble and catch my balance against the stall's countertop. "Look," I said, and presented the woman with my list, "do you sell any of these things?" 

The woman showed me a good selection of ivory teeth in a pleasant smile. "Shopping for the missus, are you, love?" 

"Whose?" I asked. "What, mine? No, no. No, no, no. I'm not married," I said. 

"Oh? Your lady friend, then?" 

"No," I said, "nothing like that. I'm not... er." 

"I'm married," said the woman with a sigh. 

"Oh," I said, "I'm sorry. Er, I mean..." 

"Otherwise," she said, with what I believe is termed a roguish smile, "I'd accept your proposal." 

I goggled. "My _what?_ " 

She reached over and tweaked my cheek. I slapped my hand over the wound. I had not had my cheek tweaked since I was in short trousers, and had thought that atrocity was the sole province of aunts. 

"Let's have a look, then," said this suspected-aunt. She scanned the list clasped in my numb fingers, moving her lips as she read. "Hm," she said. "How about some nice bananas?" 

I turned the list round. "There aren't any bananas on here." 

She held up a bunch. "Lovely, though. Had 'em in from Africa. Two quid a bunch, but, since I disappointed you, I'd let you have 'em for one-and-five." 

"I'm not partial to bananas," I said. "Haven't you got anything on the list? I held it up again hopefully. 

She squinted at it. "Oh, cilantro," she said. "You know the trick to picking good, fresh cilantro?" 

"I don't even know what it is to begin with." 

"Oh." She reached below the counter and pulled up about half a bale of something dark green and leafy. "This is what you're after. Cilantro. Fresh as daisies, tasty as you like." 

I frowned at the small forest she'd placed before me. Never having hitherto encountered cilantro in its natural state, I could not judge the freshness of this batch. The leaves were dark and wrinkly--whether this boded well or ill, I knew not. What chiefly jarred, for me, was the quantity. "I don't need that much," I said, "do I?" 

She pursed her lips and nodded thoughtfully. "You might take two. Can't have too much cylinder." 

"Cilantro, isn't it?" I asked, double-checking my list. 

"That's how they pronounce it in Portugal, where we get it from," she said. "Need a bundle of it for almost anything. No self-respecting cook skimps on the cylinder. You could easily go through the half of this in a day, and that's being careful. Plus, you save if you buy big, love. This here," she patted the rustling bale, "five quid." 

"Five pounds!" 

"Well," she said, "no, tell you what, love, since I am sending you home lonely--three and two bob. You won't find a better price for silesia anywhere in London, I'll promise you." 

"I thought you said 'cylinder.'" 

"Well, that's how they say it in Africa. Sometimes we get it from there, too. How about it, love?" 

"I suppose so," I said. I had my reservations, but the idea that one could carelessly become affianced while attempting to buy foodstuffs had my nerves ajangle and escape had risen amongst my priorities every time she addressed me as "love." I had only avoided betrothal to this aproned flinger of inappropriate endearments at the expense of some unlucky blighter who had blundered into the snare first, and this was only my first of some dozen errands. It did not bode well for the remainder of the list. 

I handed over the coin of the realm and stuffed my cilantro or silesia or whatever it was into the basket. The greenery alone took up nearly all the space; I only hoped the other items were smaller. 

The search for a butcher's stall took me a good twenty minutes and a full circuit of the square. The stall before which I finally stood--somewhat the worse for being shuttled back and forth between my fellow market-goers while carrying half a tree in my basket--was, I think, the one I had spotted first, but I cannot be sure. What mattered was that there were large slabs of various animals arrayed on the counter, and a few rather grisly bodies and strings of sausages hanging behind the vendor to lend authenticity. Not the most comforting sight for a cow or any sort of game beast, and not all that pleasant for a man who likes to see his chops lightly browned with a sprig of parsley on the side, but as meat was on my list, the sight of it was as that of an oasis to a chappie who's been knocking about in the desert for a few weeks. 

As I staggered forward out of the crush, my hand outstretched as to a mirage of water, I was hailed by the man behind the counter, a fellow who only reached my sternum, built along the lines of a cannon ball, with more stubble about his general person than one man ought to have been able to accumulate in a day, especially as it was only one o'clock. 

"Afternoon, sir," he said, and proceeded to rattle off this next like an auctioneer, gaining speed as he went, "We've got mutton--shank an' leg an' rump an' brain, just down from Scotland on the train this mornin'. Rabbit, duck an' quail, juicy as y'like, skinned an' plucked an' ready for roastin', boilin' or stewin'. Beef, fresh an' tender as--" 

"Beef!" I interjected, feeling like a man flagging down a bus by leaping out in front of it. "Beef," I repeated, "that's what I want." 

"You come to the right place, sir," said the vendor, and filled his lungs, causing his whole body to expand like a pufferfish's. "We got--" 

"Rump!" I intterrupted. "Have you got a rump roast?" When one lives with a human encyclopedia, as I do, one gets to know the signs of an oncoming entry recital. In my softer humours, I indulge Jeeves--I often learn things to my advantage, and anyhow, it keeps him happy--but I was dashed if I was going to listen to sonatas about beef from a man who hadn't mastered the art of shaving. 

As is so often the case with these amateur orators, it appeared to give this butcher the pip to be held back from his speech. He made a face like a headmaster who's just heard and failed to see the humour in a boy's explanation of what the devil he's doing in the headmaster's study after lights out, and said, "Yeh, we got rump roast." 

Seeing as he was already looking like a cannon ball with mayhem on its mind, I did not question him as to whether he was employing the royal we, or if there were another butcher hiding out beneath the racks of lamb. I only asked, "How much, my good man?" 

"Thirty quid for one roast, forty-five for two." 

"Thirty pounds!" It was, it seemed, my day for parroting prices--mine not to reason why, you know. 

"That's right." 

"It can't be," I said. "Are you sure you don't mean thirty shillings?" 

"No, I mean quid. Pounds. Sterling." 

"But how can that be? An entire dinner at the Ritz doesn't run that high. This is one roast. We are talking about a _cut_ , aren't we? Not the whole cow?" 

"Thass right," said the butcher, holding his hands out in front of him, "that's a roasting cut, about so big. Thirty quid." 

"You must think I was born this morning," I said coldly. "You can keep your rumps and everything else." 

"Suitcherself," he said with a shrug. "You won't find any better, I'll tell you that. Ask anyone." He pointed one stubby finger past my cheek and I turned to follow the gesture, but all I could see was milling people and the island of fruit, vegetable and flower stalls occupying the centre of the square. "There's another butcher's, 'cross the square, there. You ask them. But this price won't be here for you when you get back. Take it or leave it." 

"Right," I said, drawing myself up, because I would jolly well eat cake before I let a human ball and chain _sans_ chain bully me into a thirty-pound roast. "Good day," I said, and pushed off. 

A good chunk of time later, after I had passed the cannon ball again and affected not to see him leering at me in grim triumph, I at last found a second butcher--butcheress, in fact--though whether hers was the stall to which my stubbled antagonist had directed me was anyone's guess. 

"Afternoon, sir!" said the proprietress, who was considerably younger and more toothsome than the fruit stand matron, which fact nearly caused me to turn on my heel and leg it; I was clearly not hep, as they say, to the ways and customs of the Covent Garden Market natives, and if one could so easily become engaged to a woman bearing a striking resemblance to a girls' headmistress in an apron, I quailed to think how little might do it with a lass of marriageable age. 

Nevertheless, if I didn't bring home the bacon, as the saying goes--although in this case it was beef--Jeeves would venture out to procure it, and then he might meet any number of Drones. 

That being the case, I replied with as cheery a "Good afternoon" as I could muster, which in the event must not have been so very, as the young woman inquired as to why the long face, and the "love" she appended to the question did nothing to shorten it. 

"I've just been trying to buy a rump roast from one of your brothers in meat-cleaving," I explained, "who was trying to dig into me for thirty pounds. You can see, perhaps, why this might dampen the spirits a bit?" 

She agreed that she could. "Highway robbery, that is, love," she said, giving me an unpleasant shiver. A bachelor's nervous system can stick only so much endearment each day before it turns in its dinner pail. Mine was giving warning signs. "You must've been talking to Morry," continued the butcheress. "About so high? Looks like a watermelon with a five o'clock shadow?" 

"That's the chap," I said. "Though I would've said a quarter-till-midnight shadow." 

She nodded and clicked the tongue a bit. "Yeh, that's Morry, all right," she said. "He'll try to catch your newcomers an' tourists. You were right not to buy it off him, sir." 

"I thought so!" I said, relieved to have found an honest merchant spirit this time round. "Tell me, then, what _is_ the price of a good rump roast?" 

"Fifteen pounds," she said proudly, "and not a penny more." 

"Fifteen!" I cried, continuing with my parrot motif. 

"Yes, sir," she said. "Prime cut. Guaranteed tastiest roast in London." 

"But fifteen pounds!" I said. "I've had seven-course dinners for less." 

"'Course," she agreed, "but that's just you, isn't it? Roast'll feed the whole family." 

"I haven't got--" I began to say, then decided, on the whole, better not. "Yes, but see here," I said. "I'm quite sure my man would have told me if I needed to spend that much." 

"Your man?" asked the butcheress. 

"My valet," I clarified. "He usually does the marketing." 

"Ahh," she said. "I see. I see what the mix-up is. When's the last time he come out to the market, then? Last week, I'll bet." 

"Er... I don't know. I more or less let him do as he sees fit and don't ask. I suppose it could have been last week. Maybe longer." 

"Well, there you are, then," she said. "Beef's gone up since last week somethin' dreadful. Problem with the supply, y'see." 

"What problem?" 

"Oh, er..." she said, frowning. "Trains." 

"Trains?" 

"From Scotland. That's where we get our beef from, see. An' the livestock train what brings the cows down, well, it went off the tracks. So there's a shortage. Drives the prices up. Wolves, too." 

"The trains drive up the wolves?" I asked weakly. I was beginning to feel the unheralded passing of lunchtime in a certain raggedness of spirit. 

"No, the wolves're causing the shortage, too. Attackin' the herds." 

"I thought they preferred sheep," I said. "Rather like the Assyrian." 

"Sheep and cows," she said. "Wolves all over Scotland this week." 

"So, then, a leg of mutton...?" 

"Twenty pounds." 

"What about pork?" 

"Haven't got any." 

The girl seemed to swim before my eyes, and the square to turn lazily round me. 

I dug into my pocket and handed over the necessary notes. "One rump roast," I said, with the dignity of a French aristocrat clambering aboard the tumbril, "if you please, miss." 

* * *

It was a Bertram Wooster much the worse for wear who dragged himself along the sixth floor hallway of Crichton Mansions at five o'clock, brow not just bedewed but soaked with honest sweat, shirt and jacket in much the same unfortunate condition, and washed up like the wreckage of a once-proud vessel of Her Majesty's fleet, now a barnacle-encrusted relic wrenched from a watery grave by a gale summoned from the pit itself. 

I had enlisted the services of the porter on the ground floor, and so was no longer carrying the mountain of parcels, bundles and boxes I had ferried home in the two-seater, but ridding myself of the physical burden could not alleviate the spiritual. After a brief grapple with the door, I fell into the flat like that tree in the forest that doesn't make a sound because no one's listening. Only in my case, the sort of dying duck gurgle which issued from my throat was witnessed by the two men in the living room; reading from right to left, Bingo on the sofa and Jeeves standing opposite. 

We all looked at each other for a moment, and Jeeves's left eyebrow twitched, then he said, "Good evening, sir," and sailed over and I hauled myself up with all the poise I could muster, gave my man and my guest a good evening, and asked Jeeves to be so good as to pay the porter for his troubles. 

Jeeves stepped out into the corridor and a moment later he reappeared with the porter, carrying between them half the trade of Covent Garden Market, and proceeded to the kitchen. 

"Bertie," said Bingo, when the kitchen door had closed, "you look like something risen from the grave in a pulp magazine." 

"You never spoke a truer word," I said. "I have seen Hell, Bingo. They keep it ferreted away right in the heart of London, and every lost soul and devil the world has to offer is crammed into a plot of earth not even so big as Berkeley Square. The horrors these two eyes have beheld, Bingo--" 

Jeeves and the porter returned and I withheld my report. They parted at the door with expressions of mutual goodwill and what appeared to be a shilling. "Thank you, Jeeves," I said. "I've not a brass farthing on me, and I've been to the bank once today." 

I could have sworn I saw an "indeed, sir?" hovering on his lips, but all that emerged was, "Not at all, sir. If you would care to take your cocktail now, I shall run your bath." 

"A solid plan," I said, "to which I can see no drawback." 

Jeeves produced a tray from the sideboard, shook what needed shaking, poured out two glasses and shimmered off. I took mine and collapsed bonelessly into the armchair opposite Bingo. 

"Bertie," he said, "why _did_ you go to the market?" 

"It was the only way I could think of to keep Jeeves from leaving the flat." 

"What, and running off?" 

"No, it's him running into one of the Drones that worries me. You heard them at the club, they're haunting his path and dogging his steps. Think back, man, think back! Eddie had to put up with pinching and hair-pulling, and, if we are to credit Gussie's story, as I find myself unhappily inclined to do, further indignities too foul to speak of." I drained my glass and rose shakily to refill it. "The idea of anyone attempting to pinch Jeeves thrusts me into a strange and horrific new world. No, by God, anyone contemplating any pinching will have to--" 

"Your bath is ready, sir." 

My glass went flying from my hand and Jeeves, standing where he had materialised by my bedroom door, caught it deftly. It had, happily, been empty. 

"Thank you, Jeeves," I said, once my heart had returned to its usual seat after a brief sortie to the tonsil region. 

"Want me to come wash your back for you?" Bingo asked. 

"No, thank you," I said, perhaps a touch more acerbically than one should ever speak to a friend who used to give one his last piece of toffee, but, whether it was the influence of my marketing hardships or not, I thought I had seen Jeeves's eyebrow flicker at Bingo's question. My nerves were standing out from the body an inch long and curling at the ends already without Bingo throwing oil on the molehill. "I won't be long," I added, remembering my duties as a host. "Have another cocktail and, well, amuse yourself however you were doing before I arrived." 

"Right ho," said Bingo, handing his glass to Jeeves. 

I exited stage right. 

  
  
My bath did lift my spirits a bit, if only because a damp suit will always dampen them. When I emerged from the bathroom in my dressing gown, with the Wooster bouquet restored, I found both my evening raiment and Bingo lying on my bed. 

"Comfortable?" I asked conversationally as I installed myself on the one unoccupied corner of the bed to don a sock or two. 

"Quite," said Bingo. "Shall I help you dress?" 

"No," I said. "I'm quite capable of doing so under my own power." 

"But Jeeves usually helps you, doesn't he?" 

"Sometimes," I allowed. "Look--" 

"Well, he sent me in with the tray," he said, motioning to the cocktail shaker and glasses sitting on their salver on my dresser. "He said you might want another before dinner." 

"He's not wrong there," I said. 

"Allow me," said Bingo, hopping up from the bed with all the vim and pep of a man who hasn't been hauling groceries about all day. 

I pulled on the various undergarments while he was occupied with the shaker and was doing up the top stud of my shirt when he turned round with glass in hand. He gave me a reproving look. "Why all the modesty, Bertie? Have you gotten fat since I last saw you out of a suit?" 

"I'm as svelte as ever I was," I said, "and if I wasn't, today would have restored my figure. Those prize fighters who go on about their rigourous training regimes should chuck the lot and try to wrest a rump roast out of the toughs of Covent Garden Market. There's relay-running, weight-lifting and obstacle-dodging for a start, not to mention the stolidity of spirit required to face down the vendors. I tell you, Bingo, a bit of running and a leisurely tour of the gymnasium could never compare." 

"Here you are, champion," said Bingo, handing me a glass as I finished with my shirt. 

"Chin-chin." 

"You do cut rather a romantic figure like this," said Bingo. "Not the no trousers part, I mean." 

"Yes, _thank_ you," I said. I set my cocktail down on the night stand and snatched said garment from the bed. 

"I mean with this marketing and so forth," Bingo went on. "Aren't you rather like a knight of old, setting out to do battle in defense of the downtrodden?" 

"The downtrodden one is Jeeves, is he, in this scenario of yours?" I asked, fastening a suspender. 

"I suppose so." 

"He isn't downtrodden, he's mad as a... really angry thing." 

"Angry?" said Bingo. "He doesn't look angry." 

"Of course he doesn't. But he is. He didn't like me doing the marketing, though I'm dashed if I know why." 

"Hm," said Bingo. He shrugged. "Well, so we're short a downtrodden mass or two, but you're the knight, so that's good, isn't it? I think heroism quite suits you." 

By this time, I had my trousers properly in place, crease correctly aligned and all, and was pulling on my waistcoat, but I still felt several country miles as the crow flies from heroic. "Bingo," I said, "any more from you in this Gussieish vein, and I shall call the police." 

Bingo gave me the sort of look one might bestow on a kitten that's just made a bloomer of its first steps. "You _are_ in a state, Bertie. I haven't seen you like this in years." 

"You would be, too," I said, frowning, as I buttoned up the waistcoat, "in my position." I reached for my dinner jacket. 

"Hang on, your tie's crooked." 

"No, it isn't." 

"Here, let me--" 

"What? No--" 

Bingo reached for my collar and I backpedalled until my back encountered the wardrobe and there was impelled to stop. "I can tie my tie unaided, Bingo," I said, as he unknotted mine. 

"It's easier if someone else does it for you, isn't it?" 

"Not really, no. So, thank you, but--" 

Bingo brushed away my hands as I attempted to wrest control of the enterprise from him. "Go on," he said. "Have you presentable in no time." 

I frowned, but gave up the fight. My battles in Covent Garden had left me little energy for skirmishes with school chums over neckwear. "I say," I said, as he pulled the tie free of my collar and turned up the latter. "Must you stand so close?" 

"Can't very well tie this for you if I don't," Bingo answered, stepping in until his waistcoat buttons clicked against mine. He straightened the tie between us, then slid it round my neck again. 

I swallowed. "Bingo," I said. 

"Yes, Bertie?" He smoothed down the front of my shirt. 

"Er... You are in love with a, er... a girl named Gloria or Excelsior or something, just now, aren't you?" 

"Joy, Bertie," said Bingo, beginning the knot anew. "Do keep still, it is a bit trickier doing this in reverse." 

"I did tell you so," I said. "But--" He ran two fingers along the underside of my chin and tilted it up, derailing my sentence. I shivered. 

"Chin up," he said, "or I can't work." 

"Yes, but Bingo," I said, trying not to move, "you are in love with this girl Joy, then, are you?" 

"Passionately." 

"Oh, good," I said. 

"Why good?" 

"Oh, no particular reason, just... Love, you know. Can't have too much of the stuff about, I expect. Better than the alternative, I suppose, what?" 

"Mm," said Bingo, pulling the first knot slowly through. "Speaking of which, that business you mentioned last night, about men writing love letters to each other not being cricket in the Bible." 

"Yes?" I said, lowering my head enough to get a look at him. 

A markedly petulant look scrawled itself across Bingo's map. "That was a bit strong, wasn't it, considering our own history?" 

My eyes darted to and fro, the cheeks heating. The door was closed, and Jeeves presumably in the kitchen, but the man has rather sharper than average hearing, so I lowered my voice. "Bingo, I wish you wouldn't keep bringing that up. Let the past die, and all that." 

Bingo upped the ante and moved from frown to pout. The Bingo Little pout is always a harbinger of dread times--famines and plagues and things--so I hastened to add, "It only says 'men.' There's nothing in there about boys, so far as I know." 

The pout was withdrawn, to my great relief. "Still, Bertie, you can't go round clinging to scripture as if it were gospel." 

"Er--" 

"Or, rather," said Bingo, pausing a moment, undoing my tie again and beginning a new knot as he searched for the _mot juste_ , "no use being literal. There's all sorts of rubbish in there." 

"I say," I said. "That's a bit whatsit to say, isn't it? A bit un-English, what?" 

"It is precisely English," said Bingo. "The Bible would have been a very different book if the Church of England had been in on the drafting process, and rather a snappier read, I daresay." 

"How do you mean?" 

"Well, there's all sorts of things in there a proper Englishman doesn't give much weight. Never eating shellfish, women turning into pillars of salt, and no fish except on Fridays." 

"I always thought the pillar of salt lark was a little harsh. A bit beyond the pale for a don't-look-now gag." 

"Rather. And have you ever seen a respectable seven-courser without fish, be it Monday, or any other night?" 

"I suppose not. But is that--?" 

"There you have it, then," said Bingo. He pulled tight the knot of my tie, patted my shoulders and stepped back. "An Englishman's supposed to take all that with a grain of salt. And not a pillar, if you follow me." 

"Hm," I said. "You make a great deal of sense, Bingo." 

"Of course I do," he said. "I mean, you must understand, one holds all those gospel-writing chappies in great respect, of course, but the lot of them were working under the substantial handicap of being foreign." 

"I'd never thought of it like that," I said. 

"That's because you're a fathead." 

"Well," I said with a shrug. "Any objections to my putting on my dinner jacket, now?" 

"Go right ahead," said Bingo magnanimously. He retrieved his cocktail from the dresser and drained the glass. 

I checked my appearance in the mirror, fiddled with the tie, smoothed this and that and gave myself a moment to get breathing, heart rate and so forth back to standard operation. Bingo can be bad for the blood pressure, at times. Mine, anyway. 

"You know, Bingo," I said, "to touch on another aspect of last night's conversation, I did not cheat at Maths." 

"Bertie," said Bingo, "it makes no difference to the brotherly love I bear you, but I had it from your own mouth you did." 

"You certainly did not. When?" 

"The same year you got your Scripture Knowledge prize. You said you copied half the Maths exam answers off Chuffy." 

The light dawned. "Oh!" said I. "Yes, I remember." 

"There, you see?" 

"Yes, but Chuffy had them all wrong," I said, "so it doesn't count." 

"You really are in a class of your own with what you do and don't count, Bertie." 

"Thank you," I said stiffly. Not a terribly difficult feat when every muscle in my body was stiff from carting about more than a pack mule should be forced to carry and running to and fro withal all day. I had enough to contend with without my closest friends persecuting me about past indiscretions. 

Any further discussion of my mathematical prowess was forestalled by a polite knock on the door and Jeeves's announcement that dinner was served. 

  
  
"So, Bingo," I asked over the soup, "how about this affair of yours with Joy?" 

"It's all settled," Bingo said. "Jeeves has given me the perfect scheme to make a hit with her. Wedding bells will ring out within the month--you can put your shirt on it." 

"Certainly," I said. "Thrilled for you, of course." 

"I know, old boy, I know," said Bingo. He sighed happily. "He really is a marvel, that Jeeves. I can sympathise with Gussie's point of view, honestly." 

I dropped my spoon with a splash. "Not you, as well, Bingo," I said. "Anyone but you." 

"I said sympathise, not sign up with. No, I belong completely to Joy." 

"That's right," I said, "Joy. The beautiful, and, one can only assume, virtuous, tender goddess. We're clear on this?" 

Bingo chuckled and poured us both more wine. "Quite clear. Oh, now look," he sighed. "After all the trouble I went to getting your tie straightened out, you've gone and splashed soup on it." 

I shot a look in the direction of the kitchen, but the door showed no signs of opening. "Yes, that was trouble for _you_ , was it?" I said in an undertone. 

Bingo smiled. "Come now, Bertie, you needn't be coy with me. We both know you were mad for me, in times gone by. Sometimes I think you still are." 

My theory is that when God was parcelling out to His children their allotment of tact, and Bingo stepped to the head of the queue, the Heavenly Father said, "Your sunny good looks will do you, my lad," and gave away Bingo's share to the next in line. 

"I was not," I said. "I doted on you like a brother, and a right _enfant terrible_ it's made of you, too. You may be my dearest friend, old thing, but I'll have you know you were substantially easier on the eyes at thirteen than you are at even date. You are in no danger of inspiring poetry, love letters, or any other Gussieish behaviour in _me_." 

"If you say so, Bertie," said Bingo, smiling. 

"I do say so." 

Bingo shrugged. "But Jeeves--" 

The door opened at that moment and Jeeves sailed in with two steaming plates of chicken pilaf which he duly set before us. 

The soup had stirred up in the Wooster stomach a rather ravenous appetite, and the dish smelled heavenly, but the main ingredient puzzled me, as I distinctly remembered dining on roast chicken the night before. 

"Chicken, Jeeves?" I asked. "Not roast?" 

"I thought it best to prepare something more quickly, sir," said Jeeves, "since you were detained until late, and, I gathered, had missed lunch." 

"Oh," I said. Neither his expression nor his voice had betrayed any meaning to his words other than the obvious; nonetheless, the absence of not only the beef but of any item I had purchased on my expedition gave me one of those thingummies. Has something to do with soup. A _soupçon_ , that's it, of misgiving about my day's work. 

  
  
Nor was that _soupçon_ misplaced. When Bingo had wended his way home, I finished my cigarette, then went into the kitchen, where Jeeves was washing dishes. 

"I bungled it, didn't I, Jeeves?" 

"Sir?" said Jeeves, looking up from the suds. 

"You needn't 'sir?' me--you know what I mean. What's wrong with all that stuff I hauled back?" 

"Well, sir..." said Jeeves. We've had occasion to talk about this particular phrase of his before, as it often seems to me to stand in for "you unbelievable ass." Jeeves denies that, of course, but whatever it does truly mean, it never heralds anything good. 

"Go on," I said, steeling myself for the blow that must surely fall. "Don't spare my feelings, Jeeves." 

Jeeves cleared his throat quietly. "Well, sir," he said again, drying his hands and turning to face me, "unfortunately, the beef you purchased was past its best by a considerable margin, and unfit for consumption. So was the mint. Did you have a specific purpose in mind for that herb, sir?" 

"I don't remember buying mint," I said. 

"There was quite a large quantity of it in the basket, sir." 

"You mean the silesia?" 

"Sir?" 

"Silesia. It was on your list. Spelled C-I-L... something." 

"Cilantro, sir?" 

"That's how I thought you said it, but the woman selling all the greenery said it was pronounced 'silesia.'" 

Jeeves's eyebrow twitched ever so slightly. "Did this person also suggest to you the quantity, sir?" 

"Yes, she said you needed at least that much for any recipe that required it." 

"I am afraid you were misled, sir. What you were sold was mint, in a quantity too large to be useful were it either herb, and well past its prime, without being properly dried." 

"I've been taken for a ride, is what you're saying, eh, Jeeves?" 

"Sadly, sir, it is a common practice at the open markets, where no set price is advertised for the merchandise, to overcharge those unfamiliar with the going rates for inferior goods. Your case, however, sir, seems to me beyond the pale. Did I understand correctly that your trip to the bank was necessitated by the purchase of the items on our list?" 

"Not even half of them. I ran out of the coin of the realm, and I'm sure I wasn't carrying less than a hundred pounds when I left this morning. I left some of the heavier packages with an old woman in a baker's stall while I went to the bank, and when I came back, she'd packed up and left, and I had to buy all those items again. My God, Jeeves, you can't imagine what I've been through today... Or rather, I suppose you can. Good Lord, do you brave that madness every day?" 

"Two or three times a week, sir, depending on how often you have been dining in." 

"You really are a superman," I said, sinking into a chair. I rested my chin in my hands and gazed at him, awestruck. "There's not a grey hair on you, not a wrinkle. If I'd been doing this as often, I'd look like my Uncle George by now." 

"One learns the inner workings of the market with experience, sir." 

"Hm," said I. "How much of what I bought was actually any good, Jeeves?" 

"The nutmeg you purchased, sir, was most satisfactory." 

"That's all?" 

"I regret to say so, sir, but yes." 

I shuddered. The whole day, with its many dangers and hardships, for nutmeg. No, I reminded myself, for nutmeg and the peace of my household. That was something. "It was good of you not to say so in front of Bingo." 

"Not at all, sir." 

"I'll have to get more detailed instructions from you tomorrow," I said. 

Jeeves's eyebrows rose slightly. "You intend to pursue the wager with Mr. Pirbright, sir?" 

"Yes," I said. 

"But, sir, if I may say so..." 

"Yes?" 

"Today's marketing has already cost you more than the wager is worth, sir." 

"How right you are, Jeeves," I said wearily. "But the pride of the Woosters cannot be bought. Death before dishonour, and all that." 

"Yes, sir," said Jeeves, and the stuffed frog expression returned in all its chilly glory. 

I gulped a bit and stood. "I think I'll turn in," I said. 

"Very good, sir. I shall bring in your nightcap momentarily." 

"No, I'll skip it tonight," I said and added, to myself, "The juice of the grape hasn't inspired much in the way of solutions so far; maybe deprivation will do it." 

"Sir?" 

"Oh, nothing," I said. I paused in the doorway. "Jeeves?" 

"Yes, sir?" 

"Er..." I wanted to say something snappy and clever, something that would pacify Jeeves and throw him off the scent of the Drones business at once. The trouble was I hadn't enough brain power by half to come up with such an ultimate _mot juste_. "Fish," I said finally. 

"Fish, sir?" 

"Yes. When you make tomorrow's list, add fish to it. Tomorrow, I shall have fish for dinner. And lunch. And... yes, and every meal afterwards, until further notice."


End file.
